The JBE

I have a Tumblr; I'm not sure why?

[jimbaumer]

The JBE turned 1 today! Actually, it's just the JBE on Tumblr that's one-years-old. I never spend any time here--my blogging takes place at the  real JBE, which is here.

[jimbaumer]

“The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it and to foster its renewal is our only hope.” ― Wendell Berry

[jimbaumer]

The Waltons

On my real blog, I wrote about "The Waltons." Actually, I wrote about "The Waltons," nostalgia, and failing to heed the lessons of the past, or something like that.

[jimbaumer]

WHERE WOULD YOU MOST LIKE TO VISIT ON YOUR PLANET?

Europe.

[jimbaumer]

George Packer's take on "The Unwinding"

I have a real blog. It is here. At my real blog, I write about books that I read. Reading makes you smart. Most Americans don't read, which is why America is so fucking dumb. Like believing that shutting down the govt. is a solution to not wanting health insurance.

Here is the review of a real book that I posted at my real blog. The book is a very good one, but it has lots of words and no pictures, so most Americans won't read it.

[justmigrate]

Hi,

I just moved my posts from Posterous! Do go though my blog for all the new posts.

Its easy to migrate try JustMigrate

3Crumbs app - Are you the local thrifter we all have been looking for? 

[jimbaumer]

Photo of me taken last weekend while vacationing on the Outer Cape.

[jimbaumer]

"...learn, unlearn, relearn."-Toffler

This is my primary blog/website. Just migrated my old Posterous blog over here, to Tumblr. We'll see how this works.

[jimbaumer]

It's in our DNA

Looking outward is important. One of the ways we look outward is getting outside our own heads and interacting with others. Even better, spending time with friends, new ones, or old, is positive, especially friends where reciprocation (aka, give and take) is valued and practiced.

Like I did two weeks ago, I paid a visit on Saturday to see another old friend, someone that knew me back when I was younger, had a fastball, a bit less weight, as well as fewer miles on the odometer. Interestingly, my only sibling was also out visiting with an old friend in her little corner of the world, 90 minutes south of me.

A topic of discussion, which began over breakfast and continued over beers cracked and the comfort of his Adirondack chairs, was geography and how place informs who we are. Even more interesting to me was a tributary of that discussion on how socialization—as in our families of origin—and how families and beliefs influence us in much the same way that DNA operates in human development.

He mentioned being raised a certain way, in relation to religion. While he no longer subscribes to the same theology and belief system, he mentioned how it still is “there” in who he is and admitted it’s hard not to be influenced at times by those old beliefs rooted in his youth, even if it’s counterintuitive and not rational for him to do so.

For instance, in my own life, I’ve been prone to immersion in movements and taking an all or nothing approach in believing and following ideas. This has led to a number of problems, as well as former positions that I now look at and shake my head in disbelief. These things still rear their ugly heads and result in psychic pain and new efforts to move beyond them. This requires vigilance recognizing how the past can shape our view of the present and future. It also helps to know that we can move beyond these limiting thoughts and beliefs and achieve real success and true freedom.

Too often, we take the convenient path and operative out of naivete, thinking that now that we’re older and hopefully wiser, we’re less apt to fall into some of the same traps of those younger years; that would be a mistake, I think. I know I’m still prone to taking an all or nothing approach, and sometimes even worse, living inside my own head far too much, checking what I think and worrying how others will perceive me.

Does that mean I shouldn’t look at things critically and try to parse various arguments pro or con on things from dietary recommendations to political parties? Of course not!

I’ll continue to read, revel in ideas and theories, and probably embrace some new aspect of health, or tweak things I’m already doing because someone convinces me of a better way of doing things. What I am looking to avoid is making it about my own sense of value and “my ideas are better than yours”—at least that’s my goal for today.

Self-righteousness and pride in my own ability to learn new things and stay current on trends is something rooted in my DNA and what I need to remain observant of, as well as convincing others. It also has something to do in the way that I'm wired.

Another, newer friend added an important wrinkle to these ideas and thoughts, letting me know that it's ok to be me and not worry about what others think about that. Also, how important it is to spend time in my body and not just in my head.

I'm going to get on my bike and hit the road for two hours of walking (biking) my talk.

[jimbaumer]

Our daily bread (a'int white no more)

A recent medical procedure required me to adopt what I’d call a “1970s” eating regimen—white bread, Jell-O, and 7-Up, or something approximating that time period of bland, industrial food stuffs.

After reliving my childhood eating patterns, it was ironic that I’d visit the Maine State Library and find Aaron Bobrow-Strain’s White Bread: A Social History of the Store-Bought Loaf waiting for me to snatch off the library’s new books shelf.

Books like Bobrow-Strain’s take a sociological approach in explaining things and look at historical elements of life in America. Bread is his reference point that he uses to examine the attendant issues that drove white bread production and allowed America to throw itself wholeheartedly behind products like Wonder Bread and other vitamin-enriched staples of our industrial approach to food in the middle of the 20th century. The author uses bread in framing a debate Americans have been having for over a century about what we eat and how this defines who we are as a people and nation. He riffs on a theme that what we eat, in this case bread (what has been called “the staff of life), is more than merely a food and our sustenance; bread is the reference point for a discussion about larger and more complex issues, like race, class, immigration, and gender.

Tracing the history of bread-making in America, the author makes an attempt to show that championing "good food" reflects our dreams for a better society. Bobrow-Strain also looks at contemporary ways of eating and ties them into a previous movements, like when Sylvester Graham, who the graham cracker is erroneously attributed to, wrote countless essays influencing Americans at the time, leading them to believe and adopt a philosophy that said that the body was a system of interconnected fibers radiating out from the “gut” and by embracing a bland, disciplined eating regimen, could cure all ailments. That approach has been with us ever since in some form—the belief that what we eat can cure physical, as well as social ills, if we are just “religious” enough in our approach. We see this in all diet fads, as well as exercise regimens bordering on the ritualistic. 

Middle-class Americans, and those standing on the rungs above on the socioeconomic ladder, have abandoned industrial bread and now look down on a product that was ubiquitous on America’s tables.

Bobrow-Strain writes about how that very same white bread, in the early 20th century, came to stand as a symbol of wealth and status, as well as racial purity. With industrial bakers positioning their product as an icon of scientific progress, it was less about mere taste and culinary preference, but "an expression of responsible citizenship." Even as late as the 1950s, white bread was still being held up as a product that promoted strength and masculinity, warding off Cold War fears of Communism.

He addresses our  current ways of eating and how healthy foods, particularly the whole organic foods culture is framed economically, with "elites" being able to pay considerably more for foods grown organically, trucked across the country, and marked up at places like Whole Foods and other stores that cater to affluent consumers.

This follows on what became a major shift in American eating, when the 60's and the counter-culture movement brought a rediscovery of bread-baking and changes in the American diet. With it came a return by the general public to an interest in health foods, as well as environmental concerns about industrial bread-baking. Mainstream newspaper articles about rats fed a white bread-only diet, perishing surfaced and sales of Wonder Bread and others began to suffer. My mother began reading books by people like Adelle Davis and our eating would change forever.

My favorite chapter, however, was the one at the end detailing how white bread came to be a stand-in phrase for "white trash." I've read several books about how poor, rural whites have come to be marginalized by those living in privilege, where "white trash" and "redneck" are pejoratives that liberals comfortably throw around, but are actually the equivalent of calling a black the "n-word."

I find it interesting that it’s still acceptable to slam rural whites, particularly those living in the southern regions of America. A variety of writers have touched on this in other books I’ve read. Bands like the Drive-by Truckers have picked up this theme, with their primary songwriter, Patterson Hood, (from Muscle Shoals, Alabama) articulating how convenient it is to project racism on the South (even among liberals)  as if this region of the U.S. is the only place where racism still exists. This element came through clearly in the last chapter of Bobrow-Strains book.

This book, along with some recent conversations I’ve been having with a friend, as well as a family member, highlight how complete the American mindfuck really is. It’s difficult to break free from socialization that runs through every aspect of our culture, no matter how thorough your attempts are at reexamining conventional thinking. Whether it’s eating, how we get our food, our political/religious conventions and even elements of work, so much of our thinking has been shaped by things that may not be in our best interests, but have become part of what gets passed off as the accepted canon, and what it means to be a “good American.”

[jimbaumer]

Shuffle Play Friday-The Mac is Back (via tribute)

I’ve detailed my love of music before. That love and awareness of newer (and older) popular forms of rockage is what prompted me to launch and keep the Shuffle Play Friday feature alive with semi-regular posts.

College radio probably has as much to do with my interest in independent forms of music as any other source. Back in 1987, when I moved back from Indiana, Maine wasn’t awash with non-commercial sources of music on the radio. It’s hard for younger people to imagine a world without the internet, but in 1987 (and before), radio, records, and music mags and zines is how those of us that were interested in traveling outside music’s mainstream, rolled.

Some of my previous college radio sources, like Bowdoin’s WBOR and the Bates station, WRBC-91.5 FM, have really gone downhill in the quality of programming and the professionalism of their DJs. Fortunately, WMPG has upped their signal power, so community radio is accessible when I’m home and traveling south. Heading north is an entirely different challenge. Radio north of Brunswick really sucks if you want something other than public radio and NPR, or can’t take anymore Red Sox analysis via sports talk radio. Plus, it’s football season and I’d rather be waterboarded than listen to football talk.

Last Friday, I was in the Bangor/Brewer/Orono area and got to pull-in WMEB, from UMO. My travels in the area and until I passed south of about Newport allowed me to hear college radio programming that was reminiscent of the best of what I remember from my days doing my own community radio slots at WBOR in the mid-1990w. I took my three-hours seriously and always strove to put together a playlist that would rival or surpass anything the college kids were doing. Hearing WMEB’s music selections indicated that the DJs there were held to a higher standard. It also enhanced an already pleasant visit mixed with work and pleasure, to the area.

Yesterday, I was in Waterville, doing my meet and greets for WorkReady, part of my new indie contractor employment lifestyle. I’m a force to be reckoned with in business development and I bring energy and professionalism to my tasks and visits. It’s been nice the past few weeks to have a soundtrack provided by WMHB-89.7, Colby’s very fine college radio station. One show in particular has played a wealth of new music, some of it I recognize from my other sources of new music, courtesy of streaming sources like KEXP. I may be 50, but I haven’t lost my passion for music popular with the kids.

The Fleetwood Mac reference this week, which is a tribute disc, updates the FM canon from artists like, the Lee Renaldo Band, featuring J Mascis, Lykke Li, and Matt Sweeney to name a few, takes me back to my high school years, when The Mac were everywhere, to my personal consternation at the time. I’ve since mellowed in my dislike of FM and hearing bands like The New Pornographers (who I’m familiar with) and Best Coast (who I’m not) do remakes and hearing some of the tracks yesterday (WMHB-89.7) and over the prior week (KEXP) has been interesting.

[jimbaumer]

Swim, bike, run

Pushing beyond limitations, whether self-imposed, age-related, or societal is necessary for growth. At 20, taking risks and expanding boundaries is the norm. As we grow older, we tend to settle into routines and lose the verve and spunk of our youth.

If you are at all familiar with my blogging, you know I’m quite capable of navel-gazing and self-gloss. I justify all of it by saying that if we aren’t able to promote what we do ourselves, there’s no guarantee that anyone else will do it.

My wife, Mary, is the opposite of me in many ways. Often quiet, reserved, not apt to toot her own horn, and the kind of person who is happy playing a support role and letting others take the credit, it’s nice sometimes to have Mary’s pursuits occupy center stage. At the same time, never take Mary's understated qualities as meaning that she doesn't have the heart and determination of a lion.

In 2010, she took part in her first sprint triathlon when she completed the Pirate Triathlon at Point Sebago, part of a W.B. Mason group, where she works. In August of that year, she completed the Tri for a Cure.

Sprint triathlons are short-distance triathlons, usually consisting of a 750-meter swim, 20k-bike ride and a 5k-run. This is half the distance of an Olympic triathlon and less than a quarter of the distance of the Ironman. Distances may vary slightly from event to event, but they typically adhere to the above standards. Because of their shorter distances, sprint triathlons have become increasingly popular and are ideal for beginner or novice athletes.

These short-distance triathlons, while shorter in distance, are not easy. Being able to swim, come out of the water, transition out of a wet suit, make wardrobe adjustments in order to hop on a bike and do a 20-K distance, and then, run slightly more than three miles requires a level of physical dedication that most of us approaching middle age have long ago abandoned.

Mary had heard about the Revolution3 triathlon coming to Old Orchard Beach back in the spring. The Rev3 events include both half and full triathlons. A half (intermediate length), or Olympic length triathlon consists of a 1.5 kilometre (0.93 mi) swim, a 40 kilometre (25 mi) bike, and finishes up with a 10 kilometre (6.2 mi) run; the full-length course is 1.2 miles (1.9 km) for the swim, a 56 mile (90 km) bike ride, and a run of 13.1 miles (21.1 km). The ultimate is double this, which is the full Ironman triathlon.

Starting in late April, Mary decided to make her 50th year on the planet memorable and tackle the half, or Olympic-length triathlon; she began training, and joined a group of similar-minded women, called sheJAMs. Most weeks, she was out three nights training, this after a very demanding 10-hour day occupied selling office products. This means many night getting in around 9:00 pm and back at it the following day.

This morning, the Baumers rolled out of bed at 3:30 and jumped in Mary’s Rav4 and headed south to Old Orchard Beach.

It was a small payback made by Mark (our son) and I for the countless baseball games Mary attended of mine, or Mark’s. As Sean English, Rev3’s manic MC at the Old Orchard event said to me when we had a chance to meet, “a happy wife is a happy life.” The idea is that supporting Mary’s choices benefit me, also.

Today was a great day. Rev3 puts on an amazing family-friendly and athlete-centered event. From amateur athletes with plenty of heart, like Mary, to world-class professionals, Rev3 supports all the athletes that participate.

As a family-member of an athlete, I was impressed by how well the event came off, the very first time Rev3 came to Maine. They run a terrific event.

I’m proud of Mary and what she accomplished. She’s amazing in that she continues to surprise me and show me qualities of growth and accomplishment that speak to who she is as a human being.

[jimbaumer]

Traveling the state: Stopping off in Bangor, Brewer, and Orono

I spent time in greater-Bangor yesterday. No big deal--it wasn't like I'd been given a free flight to Paris or anything.

At the same time, Bangor occupies real estate in who I am and is a place that holds special meaning to me.

I went to Orono, affectionately known as "UM Zero" to some of us, on a baseball scholarship. I got hurt. Things went south, and when I woke up, I was in the land of a fundamentalist control freak named Jack Hyles. Well, that's the Reader's Digest condensed version.

While I was at Orono, my future wife was living and taking classes at Bangor Community College. We spent a great deal of time walking all over the city. We also were one of a handful of people who appreciated the closest thing that Maine had at the time to professional basketball, the Maine Lumberjacks, members of the CBA.

It was on these walks around Bangor that we figured out we wanted to get married and start a life together. It's also a place where we figured out how to talk to each other and communicate, a quality that's allowed us to stay together all these years.

After a few stops for business in Bangor/Brewer, I pointed my Taurus north and headed for the campus where my adult life's journey began.

One note about Brewer, which I rarely visited back in the early 80s and have probably been back to four or five times in the past 30 years (I don't count the I-395 spur as "visiting," I'm talking Route 1A and Wilson Street, where I was yesterday).

I don't know the history of the two communities and the rivalries that exist, not to mention, what I'm sure is some really fucked up local politics--aren't all local issues more contentious?

I'm sure the differences are similar in some ways and mirror issues affecting other "twin" cities, like Lewiston-Auburn and how one community sees itself as better, or superior to the other.

I do know that the retail strip on Wilson Street is one of the ugliest patches of strip mall development in Maine, worse than Kennedy Memorial Drive and other similar economic development disasters (like the Topsham Fair Mall area, Biddeford along Route 111, the Maine Mall area, etc.) that aren't sustainable, and kill anything that lives and breathes "local." It's a legacy left over from post WWII urban renewal and a development paradigm that reached its zenith in Maine for about 20 years, from the mid-1960s to the early 80s (see the section on Bangor's website titled, "urban renewal" for a brief snapshot of this phenomenom).

I kept thinking, "this won't go well when we're no longer a happy motoring nation," which we wont be in 50 years, but I won't go down that path in this post. I hope to stop back and tease out a few more details about Brewer during a future visit.

On to Orono.

This college town in many ways looks like it did back in the fall of 1980 when I first arrived as a green freshman from little Lisbon Falls. The foot traffic between the downtown and campus was still there, even though its summertime. Boats and other activity was abundant on the Stillwater, and there are still a bunch of locally-owned, funky places to frequent.

My choice was the Harvest Moon Deli, for lunch. I came via an enthusiastic recommendation I received from a college-age cutie pumping gas across the island from me.

I asked for a locally-owned eatery and she offered me the Harvest Moon.

Apparently they regularly garner BangorMetro's best sandwich/deil award, and I could see their sandwich board offered an eclectic and interesting variety of sanwich/salad choices.

I opted for the special, which was a Devandra Banhart. If you have any knowledge of obscure, indie music, then you might know Devandra Banhart. Chances are, you have no clue, so read and learn. Actually, he's not that obscure, but for most of my readers, he will be.

Unfortunately, the young college-age employee who brought my wrap out from the kitchen didn't know who he was and all he could offer me was a lame, "I just started working here."

He could have made my visit perfect if he had learned the customer service skills that I'm always looking for with something more in line with;

"Sorry sir, I don't know if Devandra Banhart is the singer-songwriter you are referring to, or not. Let me find out."

or, since he was being paid to work here and be customer-friendly, he might at least know who each person was on the menu board; granted, most of them are icons, like Janis Joplin and Jerry Garcia and Banhart tends to the obscure, but you are going to college and learning to think, or perhaps not.

I visited UMO about three years ago for the first ime in about 20. The school has fully embraced what I call, the "educational industrial complex." Lots of buildings, projects, new infrastructure allowing college administrators to tout their school at conferences. All of this causes tuition to go up each and every year and in the case of my young Harvest Moon friend, I'm not sure he's getting a better education than my classmates from the early 80s got.

This is a topic of some breadth, so I'll save it for later.

The best part of my visit to greater-Bangor was seeing my oldest friend, Greg. We grew up together, lived next door to each other for the first 18 years of our lives, and Greg's done well for himself.

We don't see each other enough, but when we do, we pick up our conversation as if we had talked the day before.

Friends like this are few and far between.

Addendum: I never made it uptown on the river to the American Folk Festival, which began, yesterday.

[jimbaumer]

Writing seasons

I’ve been at my craft for over a decade. Sometimes, the words come harder than at other times. Words occasionally find other outlets besides blogs to express thoughts and ideas. Of course, we live in a “look at me” period of time, so if you aren’t blogging every day, I guess you’re not legitimate.

Occasionally, I step back from public spaces and reassess what it is I’m trying to say.

It’s not that I’m not posting anything at all because I posted about a dream I once had at my other blog that is all about my personal experiences.

I’ve been at this thing called writing for awhile and I’ll continue—I just might refrain from posting every single jot and tittle about what I’m thinking, at least for today.

[jimbaumer]

Common men doing uncommon things

  I don’t do NASCAR. Sports consisting of cars making left-hand turns for hours on end don’t generally interest me. Of course, much of what passes for professional sports these days seems to be lacking something.

This morning, while returning home from an appointment related to my automobile, it was probably apropos that I’d happen to catch Ken Squier talking about racing on WJAB and for a non-racing guy, Squire held me spellbound--in fact, I sat in my car in my driveway for the last segment just to hear this guy talk about a sport I never pay attention to.

I don’t usually listen to The Big Jab in the morning because I’m not a big fan of their morning team and their callers are a step below WEEI, which is saying a lot if you listen at all to the Boston sports talk blow torch. At the same time, I’ve grown tired of the same old schtick from their morning misanthropes, Dennis & Callahan, hence my change in routine this morning. I can only take so much of what’s become a glorified soap opera with this year’s Red Sox, also.

If you know racing, I’m sure you know who Ken Squier is. His bio is pretty thorough and he’s been around racing since he was 14, announcing his first race from the back of a logging truck in Vermont, not exactly a hotbed for a sport with deep roots in the South, although New England is no stranger to the kind of racing that captivates millions of fans nationally. Squier is now in his late 70s.

What intrigued me about him being interviewed was the quality of his voice, his comfort being interviewed and how knowledgeable he sounded talking about what’s wrong with NASCAR, and offering clear prescriptions on how to get it back on track. Politicians could learn from him, especially the two nimrods currently battling for president.

If NASCAR had more Ken Squiers around and was more like the sport that was once a step removed from its moonshine-running roots, I could become a fan, I think.

Hearing him talk about the early days of racing, when the pioneers were men not long-removed from the battlefields of WWII, men that weren’t interested in “playing tennis, badminton, or softball,” but who were looking for more excitement and something that could bring them the adrenaline rush these kind of men required (I might add, a quality of male that seems in short supply in our video game culture that seems to have become the testosterone target for 21st century males).

There was something about hearing Squire wax poetic and talk with an authority that’s all-too-rare that made me want to call him up and interview him while he’s still around. He reminded me of some of the men I interviewed for When Towns Had Teams. Maybe auto racing can be my next big writing project.

[jimbaumer]

Change begins with me

I was at a meeting last week. It was the kind of dog and pony show designed by those in power to present information in a pro forma manner; basically, here’s what we’re going to do, please shut up and don’t ask questions, and everything’s going to be alright, at least best for us. Passivity is promoted in these kind s of settings where a perfunctory check-off is required.

Given my knowledge of the system being altered, I could see through the façade and recognized the BS being spread in the room (like how the proposed savings didn’t add up), I did ask questions. Partly for my own benefit, but more for the others in the room who were confused by the amount and quick dispensation of information and data. I’ll also admit it—I wanted to let the two individuals carrying someone else’s water know that “I see you and I know what you are doing.”

Often, when discussions about society’s woes and systems gone awry occur, I ask people gnashing their teeth about what they’re doing personally to change the situation. This manner of inquiry is telling because I almost always get the look, the one like I just sprouted a second alien head or something and the obsequious “what can I do about it?” question.

Change is initiated by individuals, who then gather and organize others, offering an alternative. The idea that somehow, a mass movement, always led by someone else,  is going to bring about change  is utter foolishness.  Worse, the national hope (abdication?) that flipping a coin and voting for the better of two lackluster candidates is going to return our country to some golden age of prosperity is truly magical thinking of the highest order.

Getting active requires more than complaining and it’s much more labor intensive than sharing on Facebook.

I was always impressed by the volunteerism of my late father-in-law. When our family moved back from Indiana and lived with Joe and his wife, Joan, there were several nights each week that Joe came home late from a board meeting, or providing financial direction (he was an accountant and a former businessman) to an organization on a volunteer basis.

My father was one of several men that helped to launch the Lisbon Junior Athletic League in Lisbon Falls in the early 1970s. This group of men got together on their own time, most of them after working all day, and built the original diamond that sits behind the high school and is used by both the high school softball team and the local Little League. Many of these men also served as coaches and other league officials, building a vibrant Little League program. It’s what made my former hometown the vibrant place it once was and could be again.

Keeping local baseball alive takes an incredible amount of energy and effort—I know because I spent five years keeping a semi-pro baseball league going. I started by coaching a team, and eventually took over as league president. The league was in the red in excess of $10,000. I felt personally obligated to pay this down. I ended up putting together a league program, selling ads, bartering my time for design support, and ended up retiring the debt and I left things in the black at the end of tenure. I also wrote a weekly column for a local newspaper highlighting players and teams in our league.This kind of effort and activity was common all over the state, and in almost every community. It's what prompted me to begin researching and writing my first book about town team baseball in Maine.

More often than not, the expectation is that someone else—an organization, government, boosters, whoever—will do what’s necessary for success—not the person complaining, or with all the advice for others. Often, these individual s are more likely to spend their evenings sitting at home in front of their TV or laptop, rather than finding a way to roll up their sleeves and become part of the solution.

Our so-called progress as a nation has cultivated a passive response to everyday problems that at one time fomented activity and social capital. John Michael Greer, a writer and blogger I highly recommend, wrote an in-depth blog post two weeks ago about our political passivity. It’s worth taking the time to read.

Taking personal responsibility for what's run amok and getting personally involved still matters, and in my opinion, it’s the only thing that really makes a difference.

[jimbaumer]

Shuffle Play Friday-The 51st state

Eaton’s Department Store, a high-rise of goods in downtown Montreal--no stores like this back home; Mark, age five wandered off and I’m overcome with fear that I’ve lost him. I'm about ready to find Mary and enlist store support when I come around the corner and he’s looking at toys.

I heard Canada’s rock and roll royalty on the CBC and wanted to bring the sound back south with me. Picked up Up to Here on cassette of all things. Later, grabbed Road Apples, named after horse patties, of all things, the Canadian version, frozen.

Saw them in Portland years later because I saw a plane fly over OOB with an ad trailer; Mary and I caught them on the Phantom Power tour with about 500 other people at the State Theater—must have been the summer of 1999.

Road Apples CD in my car, listening on drive to Waterville, gearing up for employer meet-and-greets.

"Little Bones” sticks in my head:

It Gets So Sticky Down Here, Better butter your cue finger up

It’s the start of another new year, Better call the newspaper up        

2.50 for a hi ball, And a buck and a half for a beer

Happy Hour, Happy Hour, Happy Hour is here

Reflecting back on the years; some good, some tough to think about.

Music, always pulling me through.