Music and Masquerade

I am not a big fan of the American musical. Yes I have been known to go to the occasional Broadway Show, yes I have actually performed in four separate productions myself, and yes I know all the words to Rent, West Side Story AND Beauty and the Beast. And I especially love that part of Les Miserables when...what was I saying? Oh yes! I don't like musicals at all.

But I have to ignore this opinion for the time being because my beautiful wife is in a production of Urinetown. And I must say, for someone with as much contempt for musical theater as I seem to have, I enjoyed the show very much. The premise behind this opera is that thanks to mass consumption, there has been a steadily worsening drought. In order to both conserve resources and turn a profit, a large corporation has set up public amenities and charges people to do their business. With the police in their pocket, they've also made it illegal to do it anywhere else. If this sounds like a familiar idea, rest assured that they hail Malthus at the end of the show. If you have no idea what that means...go read a book. If this sounds far fetched, read this!

Scary!

The musical itself was very self-aware of how derivative it was. This is a good thing. With the exception of some works of Stephen Sondheim, musicals have not brought anything new to the table for thirty years. The only way for a musical to get away with this is by giving a large wink and a nod to its predecesors. For instance, rather than a climactic Russian-Jewish bottle dance, four destitutes with toilet paper tied to their head start a lined Kossak dance in the middle of the second act. To further prevent you from taking it seriously, the narrator makes sure you are well aware at all times that this is a musical and reminds you of the various rules that musicals must follow. That added to the numerous hilarious songs make this a wonderfully irreverent show. I recommend it!



To follow up Saturday's performance, two of the castmates had decided to throw a 1980's themed costume party. But why wait until the party to dress up? I decided to show up to Urinetown as Louis Skolnick from Revenge of the Nerds. I confused many audience members who thought I was part of the show and I'm almost certain that I humiliated at least 4 out of the 7 people I showed up with. Totally worth it.

The party itself was about 40 minutes north of the theater so none of us really arrived until 11:45pm. Fortunately we were young, it was Saturday, and we had a whole extra hour to party thanks to daylight savings. Let me just say that even with fake glasses, fake teeth, and a well stocked pocket protector, I felt very underdressed. There were hundreds of people there who were dressed to the tee. I tried to keep a running tally of the various eighties icons but I only managed the following list:
6 Smurfs (two of whom were Smurfette and one of whom was Papa Smurf)
4 Ghostbusters and a Staypuff marshmallow man (none of whom planned ahead).
3 Strawberry Shortcakes
3 Richard Simmons (always fun at parties)
2 Indiana Jones
2 Magnum P.I.'s
2 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
2 Marios and 1 Luigi
2 Tom Cruises in underwear a la "Risky Business" (one of whom had a large pink dildo sticking out of his BVD's towards the end of the evening...I hope)
2 Marty McFly's
Milli Vanilli, Miami Vice, Kermit & Miss Piggy, Freddy Kruegger, She-Ra, Pee-Wee Herman, and many random wrestlers and porn stars. There was also, of course, the full line-up from the Misfits. No, not the Glenn Danzig horror punk band of the eighties, that's too obvious. This was the rival band of Jem and the Holograms Misfits. That is the second time my wife has donned this costume and it's still freaking obscure.

Other highlights of the party include Karaoke(always top notch with theater folk), a fully fuctional Jagermeister machine, and a couple beer pong tables next to the three kegs of beer. But perhaps the greatest spectacles were the two ice sculptures they had ordered. One of course was a topless woman who was gracious enough to let us do icy shots out of both of her nipsicles. The other one, in an effort to even things out, was the bent over posterior of a man who was gracious enough to let us do icy shots out of his poop-shootsicle. This was the best, not just for the embarassing pictures (yes that word has the phrase "bare ass" in it) but also for the icy square balls and pointy penisicle that were poking through the butt cheeksicles. Made for some great Kodak moments.



All in all, I think I will die happy just having seen Smurfs dominate a beer pong tournament. That night ended around 5:00am which was really 4:00am thanks to our government. And as I awoke at 6:15am the next morning for church, I was very glad to have that extra hour.

Time for entertainment. I'm sure everyone has seen this music video by now, but I like it...so there.


And now another version:

Wave'em Around Like You Just Don't Care.

Working in an office setting can be very disheartening. You get the impression that you were made for something more in life, especially if you happen to have a Bachelor of Arts in music. Other than impressing my co-workers with the various harmonies of "Afternoon Delight" by the Starland Vocal Band, there are not many outlets for my musical talents. So when the choir director at my home church asked me if I would like to take a crack at conducting the church choir, I jumped at the opportunity.

Until college, I was primarily a pianist (stop snickering). I took many lessons and spent a lot of time pretending to practice. But college taught me that while piano playing can get you girls, you won't always have one handy. I'm reminded of the Far Side cartoon in which a group of cowboys are sitting around the fire and one says to the other, "Slim, why don't you take that thing out and play us a song". Of course his compatriot Slim has a grand piano sticking out of his back pocket. It became clear that more portable forms of music would be needed to woo the girls. Not that getting chicks was my only concern (be it my primary). I began to learn guitar and I began to learn how to sing.

It worked! One love song later, I scored me a wife! What was more unexpected was that I learned to actually love the singing. I had even involved myself in various singing ensembles such as college choir, a touring group known as Turning Point, church choirs, and I was even an alternate tenor for the Basement Four, an on-campus barbershop quartet. Not only did I learn the Tenor II part for the Simpsons' "Baby on Board" from my experiences, but I also learned how to conduct a group of singers. Yes, like Ringo Starr and George Carlin before me, I had become an able conductor. And I will pay you all money to ignore that "Shining Time Station" reference just now.



Though my various interships and concerts may have honed my hand-waving skills, nothing really prepared me for the "home game" aspects of choral conducting. You see, church choirs have a unique social structure: elders + way it's always been = good; new blood + different styles of music = BAD! I've heard many horror stories from young choir directors accepting new posts in old churches. It's not so much that they're hazing the nooB's as it is disrespecting them altogether. So as a potential "whipper-snapper", I was genuinely afraid of telling my church choir how to sing correctly.

But fear is the mindkiller, and choirs respect confidence, so I practiced conducting. Ever see anyone practice conducting? My plumber got a good look as he was replacing a rotted-out garbage disposal (that was messy). I stayed home to babysit him and took the opportunity to run through a Christmas Cantata (tata...he he he). I looked like a crazy person swatting at things unseen (and unheard) but at least I learned it. I now had the confidence to face my choir, though I may think twice about facing my plumber again.

Sunday came and I was serving double duties ::snicker:: as I was both the organist and the choir director. I would play a hymn, then run around and wave my arms at people. It was quite the circus. But I handled it like a pro, with the exception of forgetting to direct the choir to sit down. They stared at me for a little while until I got the hint. I felt like Wil Smith after ditching Stevie Wonder on stage after the "Wild Wild West" performance of the 1999 MTV movie awards. The following week, I did not make the same mistake. After two weeks of managing the music for my entire congregation, I felt that my music skills were finally put to good use.

Speaking of barbershop quartets, here is a video that has nothing to do with barbershop quartets.

When Irish Eyes are Hitchhiking

This last Saturday was Justin's famous annual "Irish Beer-Tasting Party". Well, it's not that famous. And this was really the only one, so it's not really annual. But we all wore green shirts and drank good beer so it was at least an "Irish Beer-Tasting Party".

But Princeton is a bit of a hike for me. I felt that if Liz and I were going to commit to this party, we should do a trial run first. So Friday evening we drove up to Princeton to dine with Justin and Alycia. We made pretty good time, but I think we could have done better with a decent pit crew. Justin made an excellent dinner, of course (is that a pun? no). Even if it sucked, I'd probably lie on this blog since he might read it. So did I like it? I'll never tell. Mind bullets! After dinner, Justin and Alycia wanted to surprise us with Quark Park. They wouldn't tell us what that meant but since we were in Princeton, I just figured it was some hipster-homo hangout with coffee and uninteresting books. I was pleasantly surprised. Apparently, the local Princeton University (whose name escapes me) had funded a series of socially experimenal art pieces. The amazing thing is that all of these exhibits were left out in a small public courtyard for all manner of persons and elements to influence and potentially ruin them. The even amazing-er thing was that the entirety of this exhibition was completely unharmed and unvandalized in any way. I could have walked out of there with a silver beach ball, a couple throw pillows, and long strains of blown-glass bubbles if I was so inclined. But I, like many others, was not so inclined.

It was surreal. But not as surreal as the game of Scattergories that awaited us back at Justin's. I'll save you the play by play and just give you the highlights:
1. Liz tried to pass off "Pound Puppies" as a farm animal...survey says 'no.'
2. Justin admitted that he would: "Totally give [Liam] goneria." Poor Alycia.
3. Liam is ugly and stupid. That wasn't really a highlight of Scattergories. It's just been a whole day since I've berated him properly.

In short, Scattergories was fun. But there was a more important matter to attend to that evening. Sure, we'd made it to Princeton in pretty good time, but what about the trip back? The test-run was only halfway completed. And boy am I glad we took precautions. As I was approaching my desired exit, a loud shreiking pop in the hood of my car told me something was awry. This was confirmed by my battery light glowing red, my engine temperature rising very rapidly, and the loss of a little something called power steering. I'm not an extremely weak man but I sure did miss power steering when veering around the excessively winding exit ramp. When the temperature gauge on my dash hit the big red H, I decided to pull over and call AAA.

No, I wasn't binge drinking (not that night anyway), AAA is the company that steals my money and me sends crappy roadside service. I phoned in a tow-job (out of the gutter guys) at 1:16 am. When AAA called me at 3:00 to apologize for the delay, I was a little impatient. But I didn't expect to finally get service at 3:40 am. Some of us have bladders you know. The man was nice enough to tow my car and drive us to a service station about 3 miles from where we live. During the ride, I gathered that he was a Nickelback fan, a sports nut, and had been awake for the last 52 hours. At least it was raining so there was absolutely no chance of feeling safe in his care. Lack of good personality aside, we were still hoping he'd give us a lift to our house after the tow. A curt "No dude, I live that way" and a sound ditching confirmed that we were not getting a lift. Not trusting AAA to send us a taxi before Thanksgiving, we decided to hoof it and walked the rest of the way home at 4:30 in the morning.

The following day, after I paid the mechanics $250 to put a rubber belt in my car, I felt that I was well-prepared for the evening ahead. If need be, I was fully trained to ride in a tow-truck and walk great distances. Fortunately, that sort of trepidation was not required for the beer-tasting that awaited us that evening.

There was stew, shepherds pie, spinach balls (that's what we're calling Popeye nowadays), beer bread, artichoke dip, mashed potatoes, and of course beer, beer and more beer. I had the pleasure of drinking a robust porter, a black and tan, an irish ale, a double-chocolate stout, and a shot of Tallamore Dew on top of all the aforementioned food. I don't think I've ever wanted a second stomach more than last night. But being fat and drunk doesn't make a party "Irish". You need to be fighting as well. So Liam, Sean and I punched and tackled each other whenever a moment presented itself.



Other battles occurred that night, most of which were Soundgarden vs. Pogues related (don't ask). But all in all, we were eaten, drunk and merry. I rested well that night.

Movie time! This next video was actually directed by Mike Nesmith, the bobble-hat-wearing fake guitarist from the Monkees. He left the band to pursue a career in movies and this is one of his brainchildren:

What are banks for?

This may be common knowledge, but I am not a morning person. It takes me 8 or 9 hits on my snooze bar to wake up, it takes me two cans of Mountain Dew to be a useful member of society, and apparently it takes me two seperate purchases to realise that I should probably destroy all things associated with my previous bank account.

As Liz and I were rounding our 9 months of marriage mark, we felt that we should take things to the next level: we decided to get a joint bank acount. This sounds like an obvious action for a married couple but you'd be surprised how much I didn't feel like doing it. Not to anthropomorphize Commerce Bank, but I had become quite attached to the fact that my tellers were in spitting distance of my workplace (not that I spit on them regularly or anything...shhhh). But eventually, laziness gave in to logic: it was less paperwork if we just had one bank between us. The represetative's name at Wachovia Bank was Beauty. It took all my effort not to say, "She's a beauty" in the most Deliverence-laden accent possible as she set up our new life's savings. But I kept my mouth shut and before I could say, "Squeal like a pig" we had our own joint checking and savings accounts. It was rough, but at least it was over and done with. I closed out both of my Commerce accounts (all 13 dollars worth...no lie) and called it a day.

That brings us to last week. I was on my way to work when it dawned on me that I had not packed any Mountain Dews for the work day ahead. This upset me as much as it could possibly affect the zombie I felt like. But as providence would have it, a 7-11 was waiting around the next turn so I prasied God...or rather hummed lowly since I was still pretty groggy. They were hiding the 12-packs in the back corner next to the ATM behind an empty stack of pallettes. For the same reason stoners can be MacGuiver when it comes to bongs, my bed-riden brain was able to swiftly seek out this stash of sugar water with no trouble. I laid the soda and a donut (for my troubles) on the counter and casually took a Visa-debit card out of my wallet and handed it to the cashier. I was pretty embarassed because I only had a dollar of cash on me. I was even more embarassed when after 5 seperate tries, my card was rejected every single time. After the sixth attempt, my heart fell. I knew that I was only going to be able to buy the donut. I surrendered the flurescent goodness and bought the donut for 79 cents. I would have traded all the king's donuts for that Mountain Dew. I angrily tried to use the ATM at the back only to realize that I had been using my old Commerce Bank checking card (on the third try, folks). You would think that was the stupid part, but you'd be wrong. The stupid part is that I didn't shred that card 6 months ago when I got my new account. The stupid part is that I left this useless piece of plastic in my wallet. I'm stupid. Oh, and you'd better believe I went back for the Dew. mmmmmm...Dew.

Later that week I received a notice from the Motor Vehicle Commision a.k.a. my arch nemesis. It told me that a check had been rejected and that if I did not pay the initial ammount plus a $25 "rejected check fee" (gay), they would suspend my driver's license indefinitely and it would cost $100 to reinstate it. You see a month and a half ago, I finally looked at my license as the officer was handing it back to me and I discovered that it was going to expire the very next week (like how I sidestepped the officer angle?). I chose that Saturday morning (at 7:45am ...ugh) to take my checkbook and get that dang thing renewed...which I did. I really did! And that was definitely the check they were saying was rejected. Did I forget to sign it? Did I fill in the wrong amount? date? temperature and humidity? I know you folks have already figured it out so it should really reflect how dumb I am to have to hear from the New Jersey Department of Revenue that Commerce Bank did not recognize the account on that particular check. I had done it again...or rather before...before the card with the...shut up! I must now hunt down and destroy a certain checkbook. Do you realize they made special hats for people like me in olden days?

I feel like both of these tragedies could have been averted had they happened after noon. But what's done is done...and very funny at my expense.

Right now, I have no time for anything except enjoying the crap out of Season Eight of the Simpsons. This may very well be the very best season of the Simpsons ever. With such quotes as:
"Sugar? [fumbles through pockets] Sugar...sugar...AH! Here you go. Sorry it's not in packets"
"Your ideas are intriguing. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter"
and my personal favorite, "Sneaking into town was worth it. That was some good corn"

How can you go wrong? If you could only buy one season, get this one. If not just for this:

My name is Jesse and I approve this message.

Time for a movie. This is the finale from Chris Bliss's juggling act. It is set to the last few cuts of Abbey Road and I think it's freaking cool. It plays kind of non-fluidic so look it up on Youtube if you really want to admire his prowess. Hey! Quit looking at his prowess, perve.