Nobody Wants To See That

Here's three signs you're doing too many drugs:
1. You dub yourself the Wizard
2. You attend events wearing wizard robes
3. You decide, while attending said event to doff your wizard robes (how would people then recognize you as a wizard? You wizard's staff?)
Don't get me wrong, I'm not totally opposed to public nudity, but there's a time and a place for it. Unfortunately, these proper conditions rarely occur, and so you're forced to see someone naked who would be best served leaving their clothes on. But isn't that always the case?
This is another example of the Idiocracy that we've become. Rather than go to see a performance by an artist, we're constantly forced to have to deal with selfish people who want to add their stamp to it, whether or not it spoils the performance for everybody else. When I go to a festival such as Coachella, I'm there to see the many acts on the line up, not have some asshole show me his asshole. Take your neediness and thirst for attention somewhere else. Or better yet, grow up!
being the father of two young boys, I know that when they are younger, they like to run around and flap in the breeze. Sure it's cute, but at some point in parenting, it behooves a parent to teach a child that, while there's nothing wrong with a little full frontal, people's right to not see your junk overrules your right to wave it in front of their face.
To make this a full piece of performance art, police at the event came along to taser the Wizard, thereby making it more entertaining for everyone involved. I know we're devolving into a police state where cops are ever more eager to taze people, but in some cases, I do believe it's justified. Just put your clothes on, dude. Nobody wants to see that.

We're Number One! We're Number One!

After falling behind so many other nations in everything we used to lead, America is leading the rest of the world in one department, I mean, aside from the invading countries to steal their oil department.
According to the WHO, (the UN Organization, not the rock band)the US leads the world in substance abuse. Woo-hoo! Let's all raise a glass of Budweiser and drink to that!
Researchers say countries with looser drug laws have lower rates of abuse, but how else would we lock up our poor, our indigent, and our black people? I blame it on television which, when it isn't glamorizing drinking, or touting the latest pharmaceutical miracle cure to ask your doctor about, is putting on anti-drug commercials so lame, they actually "increase pro-drug attitudes in teens".
So the next time you're heading for the local hideout to quaff a few brewskis, do the patriotic thing and hoist a couple more, and keep America leading the world in something!

Everywhere You Go, There's a Drunken Idiot

I took my boys to their first concert this weekend, to see 1964-The Tribute, a Beatles tribute band. The guys have been really been into the Beatles for sometime, and their step-father gave us some tickets for Christmas (he's not such a bad guy-for a Guard recruiter), so we hopped into the car and headed down to the State Theater in Kalamazoo.
We went down early and walked around downtown Kazoo looking for a place to grab some dinner. We found a nice place, although the guys became confused because it had cloth napkins and they didn't know whether they were napkins or handkerchiefs. Wilbur found a quarter on the floor under our table (which he is holding up in the picture) and nelson is holding up an after dinner mint.
The crowd was mixed, aging boomers and young hippie-wannbes coming together in celebration of the music that was John Paul George and Ringo. The band did a fantastic job of recreating the four piece sound of the Beatles, the kids loved it, with Nelson singing along with every song. They did two sets, and left the stage, then Wilbur wanted to go.
"Wait," I said and began clapping rhythmically with the rest of the crowd, "Encore."
Sure enough, the band came back and did a two-song encore.
"I can't believe we encored them!" said Wilbur delighted. I didn't tell him that most bands will do that.
All through the show, there was a man who had imbibed too much sitting behind us, and in between songs, he would holler"Norwegian Wood!" or "This Bird Has Flown" like the band was a bunch of trained monkeys asking for requests. I knew they wouldn't do it, because one, the Beatles never performed it live, and two, there was no sitar on the stage. But it didn't stop this jerk from yelling it out every chance he got. And we didn't let him ruin our good time, either, all the way home we kept making fun of him by yelling out "Norwegian Wood", or "This Bird Has Flown".
I thought I might see my brother Sean at the concert, since he gets into shows like this, but the drunken idiot brought back a recent memory.
In 2004, he and I went to see the Vote For Change Tour at Cobo hall (or maybe it was the Joe Louis) in Detroit. It was a great concert, with Bright Eyes, REM, Bruce Springsteen and John Fogerty. It was sponsored by Move On, in an effort to get voters registered to help elect John Kerry, and more importantly, get rid of George Bush.
The crowd was into it, except, once again, behind us sat another drunken idiot. When ever anyone urged people to vote, or spoke out against the war, he would boo, or yell out "Four more years!" I did my best to ignore him, figuring that there was probably a time when I was that drunken idiot, thinking I was being funny when I was really being a moron, but my brother became upset, and let that one person ruin what was an awesome concert. He then swore he would never see another concert again, and to this day, will not go see any artist at all.