258. miscelaneous bits

I'm going to use this post to catch up on some small things that I want to share about - things that are too small to warrant an entire entry of their own.

1. Two summers ago, I traveled down the west coast for a week with my band. We landed in Seattle and during the course of the week we drove down to San Francisco and then to LA. That was a lot of driving and we tried all kinds of different road games and discussions to keep ourselves from going absolutely stir crazy.

I remember one of the things we talked about was concerts. We asked each other, if we could see any band in concert, who would it be. I think I probably answered with the bands Rush, Sheryl Crow, and The Police. Out of the three, the one band I wanted to see most was The Police because their drummer, Stewart Copeland is one of my mostest favoritest drummers of all time. I can't stress how much his playing has taught me about manipulating time on the drum set while still maintaining the pulse and drive that rock music demands.

At the time, I said that even though The Police is the band I wanted to see the most, it's also the band that had the smallest chance of getting back together. At the time, Sting's career was still going reasonably well and I always knew that as long as Sting was doing well by himself that he wouldn't be a part of any kind of Police reunion.

What a difference two years makes. When's the last time you heard of Sting? Was it, perhaps, when the announcement went out that The Police were getting back together for a freaking REUNION TOUR!

Tickets went fast for the show. I think I logged on about two hours after tickets went on sale online and couldn't find a ticket at any price. I was stunned and heartbroken. I checked ebay and discovered that tickets were in the thousand dollar range. I was kicking myself because I thought I had lost my chance to see them in concert.

On a whim, I logged onto Ticket Master again that night and I guess earlier that day the servers were just jammed because I didn't have any trouble at all finding seats. I mean, they weren't the best seats by any means, but there were seats. I ended up taking a chance and buying seats behind the stage. I'm hoping that I'll have a bird's eye view of Stewart Copeland and that I'll be able to watch him do his thing...and maybe even cop a few new licks for myself.

2. Spring is just around the corner and let me tell you, it's a beautiful sight. There are blossoms on the trees and their bursts of color are like fireworks tethered to the ground by bark and branch. It makes me feel giddy.

You know, I just had a thought. It's stupid to have Valentine's during the heart of winter. Spring is the time for love. Someone should start a crusade and have Valentine's Day moved to April, maybe a week after taxes are due as a way to unwind.

3. My band got to play our first show in Seattle. We actually played a couple shows up in Everett at a place called Jimmy Z's, but the other night, we got to play at The Central Saloon in the heart of Pioneer Square which is supposed to be where a lot of live music goes down. We had the midnight slot on a Sunday night so the place wasn't exactly packed with people but I think we put on a kick ass show anyway. I know I had a blast.

Oh and speaking of the band, we have a new bass player. His name is Drew. He's only nineteen but he acts and plays like someone older and wiser. With Drew being nineteen, we actually have a sixteen year span of ages in the band; this in addition to the fact that we have an African-American, two Asian-Americans and now a white guy in the band. We used to joke that if (when) we ever go on tour, we're going to call it the Affirmative Action Tour because we'll sue any club that doesn't let us play for discrimination. We're itching to play and we'll bust out the race card if we have to.


Let's see, was there anything else?

Ah yes.

4. To the guy who borrowed my DVD of Punch Drunk Love back in Hawaii, I hope you know that you've robbed me of one of my favorite movies. I'll probably be buying myself a new copy soon because it's one of those that I never get tired of watching.

Just to make sure of this, I rented a copy from Netflix and sure enough, the movie brought back the same wild and quirky high that it did when I first saw it. And I didn't realize it until I saw the movie again but a lot of my favorite movies have to do with two odd misfits finding one another. Movies like Secretary and Amelie. And I suppose it's because I see myself in these movies. I don't think I'm like most people and I'm not just looking for a pretty girl to go out with. I want to find someone who also feels a bit like a square peg in a round world.

There's this great scene in Punch Drunk where Barry Egan (Adam Sandler) and Lena Leonard (played by the oh, so lovely Emily Watson) are in bed whispering to one another about how much they love the other, and they do so in a way that is bizarre but sweet in a twisted, Hannibal Lecter kind of way:

Lena: You're face is so adorable, your skin and your cheek. I want to bite it. I want to bite your cheek and chew on it, it's so fucking cute.

Barry: I'm looking at your face and I just want to smash it. I just want to fucking smash it with a sledgehammer and squeeze it, you're so pretty.

Lena: I want to chew your face and I want to scoop out your eyes and I want to eat them, chew on them, and suck on them.

Barry: Okay. This is funny.

Lena: Yeah.

Barry: This is nice.

What I find so striking about this scene is how Lena and Barry are able to be their true, strange, slightly bent selves with one another. Not only that, but even though they're saying these outlandish things to one another, they're actually speaking terms of endearment, only they're doing so in a way that is unique to them.

Do you see how beautiful that is? That these two people can say things to one another that most people would misunderstand as horrifying and repulsive but in their minds, these are complements of the highest order. And they get it. They don't hear violence in those words, they hear love but even more important than that, they've found someone who speaks the same skewed language and sees the world through the same skewed lens. They were cut from the same piece of cloth.

Now I'm not about to start talking to women about sledgehammers and eyeballs but I do want to end up with someone with whom I can be my true, not safe for public consumption self. I don't want to have to worry about acting like everyone else. And I want her to be herself as well. I want to meet someone with a few dents and dings, someone a bit off center. I want to let her know it's okay for her to be her oddball self around me.

That's what I see happening in Punch Drunk Love and in Secretary and in Amelie. Oh, and also in American Beauty - the way Jane Burnham (Thora Birch) and Ricky Fitts (Wes Bentley, the kid who was always videotaping stuff) are two misfits who are misunderstood until they find each other.

5. Okay, I think that's all.

Geeze, I thought this was going to be a short, simple post. Here I am three hours later still at it. I better post this sucker before I think of something else to write about.