8.11.2008

Affirmations for the Overly Entitled

Say each of these affirmations ten times upon waking, before sleeping, and before entering any kind of public space.

1. I am not the only person on the planet.
2. I am not Carrie Bradshaw.
3. I have to wait my turn.
4. Strangers do not have a great need to hear my cell phone conversations.
5. When I get drunk and can no longer stand properly, it is interesting and humorous only to me.
6. I am no more important than the guy behind the deli counter. In fact, I'm probably less important.
7. I am not on a reality TV show. Cameras are not following me at all times, and people do not care what I think, or whether or not I'm a tough competitor.
8. Even if I am on a reality TV show, people don't care what I think.
9. My bad manners are ugly, no matter how much I spend on my clothes.
10. I have the right to be as pushy and arrogant as the next guy. And that makes me no better than the next guy.

UPDATE: Number 11 has been deleted due to popular demand.

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8.07.2008

Television is the New Radio, 2

Someone sent in the You Tube link to LS3 on Craig Ferguson! (thank you, thank you!)

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8.05.2008

The sound of 110,000 hands clapping

A long day, then a long line and a long wait for the bus to New Jersey. There was trouble on the Jersey Turnpike. Probably a tractor-trailor truck jack-knifed across the highway. It’s always a tractor truck.

It was after 8 o’clock when we finally got on a bus. I joked to my friend V, “I hope Bruce waits for us.”

Nothing to worry about, of course, because almost half of Giant’s Stadium was still empty as we took our seats. Bruce did indeed “wait for us.” He started after 9:30. I wondered if that meant he would cut the concert short as a result.

There was a woman below us, hanging over the railing of the stadium’s mezzanine, dancing awkwardly to music that hadn’t started yet. She was drunk, so drunk that a stadium usher eventually had to escort her off somewhere. So much for her 100-plus-dollar ticket.

V and I had arrived as disembodied spirits, exhausted from our respective jobs and other life fatigue, Our bodies were sitting at the last row of the mezzanine, but our spirits were in our apartments gathering laundry, at the office finishing some redundant tasks, riding the bus home wondering how long it would take. The lights went out and the crowd started screaming, and V and I sat there, secretly hoping Bruce WOULD cut it short.

And then the music started.

The fans always do their homework, always know every word, every chorus, for every song, from the oldest to the newest. Bruce conducted everyone who was not already standing to get to their feet. And we obeyed.

It was the musical equivalent of fireworks. How do you describe fireworks? You can't. A person has to be there to witness it first-hand.

Incredibly, Bruce is always incredible.

It took exactly two songs to become re-embodied, brains and body in one place.

Summertime Blues. Okay, I’ll stand for that. Wait, is that “Prove it All Night”? Ack! I can’t sing in this key! Wait, he’s going into the audience! He’s singing to a girl in the first row! She just kissed him! Talk about up close and personal...wow, this guy can’t get any sexier...Did he just do a somersault in the middle of that guitar rant?...Oh, yeah, Born to Run, with the house lights on, and everybody singing.

A short four hours later, the show ended.

Stuck in the parking lot on the way out, we were in line with a woman and her 12-year-old son. They were here from Vegas, and the kid had never seen Springsteen and his mom is a big fan who doesn't get to see him any more.

"They won't invite him to Vegas, He played there once, but they won't invite him back. They didn't like the fact he played so long. They want the people to get back to the casinos."

Bus home, drunk young republicans standing over us. (One of them makes a comment about a song not being patriotic, not sure if he meant bruuuuce’s.) One voice is particularly loud, incredibly crude. ““She wants me, Bro, I’m going to spread her cheeks!” He is apparently referring to someone in the group’s sister, who is no, not on the bus with us. Yikes, dude, have you looked in the mirror lately? Pasty and chubby, sweaty and stupid. I make the comment to V that he’ll be a lot less boisterous when he’s not a virgin anymore. Then there’s an awful smell, and it’s obvious who it came from. When someone comments on it, our loudmouth says things like “I WISH that were me!”. What the heck does THAT mean? I wondered how that nice mother and son from Las Vegas were feeling about this idiot. Of course, the jerk had to stand right next to ME.

But I am bruuuuuucified, mood altered, feeling fine and at one with myself, and that is what I am left with when I wake up late the next morning, not the ugly memories of that Stupid Farting Young Repulbican with entitlement issues.

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