Song of the Day - "Perfect Strangers Theme"

I have had a goal for the last ten years or so to turn this show into a Broadway musical. Since everything seems to be a fucking musical these days, I think my plan needs to come to fruition finally.

The setup is perfect. Vaguely Greek fish out of water/gay dude from Beverly Hills Cop, high flying Peter Pan pitchman. Lots of chicks with (presumably) feathered hair and pastels. The whitest description of Chicago ever portrayed in entertainment. And doesn't the tune make you want to take the world by the short hairs? "My life, my dreams, NOTHING'S GONNA STOP ME NOW!" How could it fail?

I'm going to Chi City next week for work. I may have to start doing some preliminary research while I'm there for my $10 million idea...

Winnipeg Day 2 & 3

Okay, so it's been a busy week since I returned from Winnipeg. I figure that I should at least finish what I started with a day two rundown of the trip, you know.

Most of day two in Winnipeg was spent dodging drunken Indian folk waiting at bus stops (again) and acquiring Canadian stuff. I bought a "Canada" Starbucks mug, a shit ton of Canadian goodies that you can't find here (Ketchup and All Dressed chips, a Cadbury Halloween assortment, Aero Bars) and ate some Boston's. Yes, I broke my trip rule and ate at a chain restaurant we have in the U.S. But at least I ordered a Molson "M"...which was like a boozier, skunkier version of Canadian. It was wonderful.

The whole draw of the trip was seeing Pearl Jam. And holy shit, they did not dissapoint. We ended up sitting 4th row, and at one point I was like ten feet from Eddie Vedder. I've been close at concerts to artists before, but never someone of the magnitude of Mister Vedder. I have a weird quirk where I don't really view celebrities or musicians as real people, they kind of exist as a cross between a demigod and a robot in my odd mind. So being that close to one of my favorite artists of all time blew my cranium up in ways I can't really put into words other than "fucking rad".

The set list was nowhere near as mind blowing as the two nights in Alpine Valley, but it was solid. I never much cared for the song 'Present Tense' but PJ was on some chhhuuuuuuch shit doing it live. It was my second favorite live moment by the band (numero uno was 'In My Tree' live at the PJ20 shows). And they closed with 'Indifference', which meant over the course of two weeks I pretty much got to see all of Ten and .vs done live.

Checkout time from the shit hole known as the Marlborough Hotel was probably the biggest buzzkill I have ever experienced. My friends driver side window was smashed in (probably by the awesomely named Winnipeg gang "Money Over Bitches"). Since the city is closed on Sundays, we had to drive 7 hours home with an open window. Not even the awesomeness of Tim Horton's could save the return.

Overall, the trip to the great white north was pretty so-so. Canada has it's own social problems (that I didn't ever expect to and never have come across up there) but at least Pearl Jam rocked. Maybe if they play Toronto or Thunder Bay or something next time, I'd be more pumped. Winnipeg is going to be on the "do not visit" list for the forseeable future though.

Song of the Day - 'Redemption' by Frank Turner

This song comes on like a transmission from some other time, when songwriters (well, besides maybe Craig Finn) could be vunreable, could be a fucked up mess. This is about as far away from pop music as you can get today, and that's a very good thing. Leave the party to clowns like LMFAO, let's hear some goddamn real talk for once.

Is the grass always greener on the other side when you are in a meandering relationship? Can we make our lives better than our parents? We all may think that it's better with someone new, that a college degree or a better car than mom and dad is a win. Usually that's not the case, and you want back with that old flame or you respect what your elders had that you don't.

The whole "England Keep My Bones" album is fantastic, but this is the cut that you will keep coming back to.

Song of the Day - R.E.M. - Leaving New York

R.E.M. was around so damn long it seemed people forgot about just how awesome they were. This makes my top five R.E.M songs list, and is one that most people slept on. I could have as easily have gone with 'At My Most Beautiful' or 'Bang and Blame' or 'Mine Smell Like Honey' as another great overlooked single.

Cheers to 31 years, for inventing (along with The Replacements, Husker Du, The Minutemen, et al) Alt Rock Nation. And for providing me with the cassingle for 'Shiny Happy People' when I was 10...

Winnipeg Day 1

The Great White North is riddled with homeless Indian punks...or that is what I took away from my first night in Winnipeg.

I left MPLS at 8 yesterday to head up to Winnipeg for a Pearl Jam show. The drive only took about seven hours, bit felt much longer because I was driving through the barren wasteland that in North Dakota. The only Ndak highlight was stopping at a gas station called Superpumper (which I will call the first porn I direct). At about 4PM we rolled into the land that 1989 forgot...Winnipeg.

Everything here looks like a suburb circa 1989. Tons of neon signage for gas stations, grocery stores and fast food places. Lots of sweatpants. It's sort of comforting in it's time warpedness. As we were about to go out and enjoy some Poutine for the evening, I got harassed for 35 cents by a homeless Indian in a Winnipeg Blue Bombers hat (the script kind that Rappers used to wear in the late 80s). I also watched a bunch of Indian punks in Tupac and Kimbo Slice hoodies loiter at a bus stop. It was sort of surreal. In MPLS, you can go a lifetime without seeing an Indian hip hop punk. Here, I saw 10 in five minutes.

Anyways, the Poutine was delicious. There were three news stories in thirty minutes about the Jets coming back, my credit card stopped working due to it crossing an international border, and I passed out after three beers at 11pm ( only to be awakened mid sleep by my neighbors headboard slamming on the wall). Very odd evening and I hope day 2 turns out a tad less odd.

Song of the Day - 'Here You Come Again' by Dolly Parton

This sounds like sunshine. It is like bouncing down a sidewalk on a summer day, bomb pop in hand, on the way to 7-Eleven to buy some baseball cards.

I would like to dedicate it to Tom Brady, because your supreme masculinity, flowing hair, dime piece wifey and football godhood make me fall for you. Like Debbie Gibson, I get lost. Lost in your eyes.

1994 MTV Rock N Jock Basketball

I cannot describe how giddy I was to find this on YouTube today.

You've got Rapaport, you've got Queen Latifah ballin' out of control. Shawn Kemp treating this game like it's the fucking actual All-Star game. The legendary Bellamy-Cortese rivalry. Kareem coaching. Mad buttcuts on the white dudes. The 25 point shot!Did I mention Rapaport?

I would kill for this to be released on DVD. This is the visual equivalent of Prozac, it's guaranteed to break you out of a funk.

Two Grown Ass Men Chat About "Thunder Island"

The song "Thunder Island" by Jay Ferguson is one of the most hot fire, bodacious, awesome songs of the 70s. Sung about some sort of tryst with a girl who's hair was "the color of an Indian Summer", the song reached #9 in 1978. As a child, I always had assumed that Ferguson and that fine ass little lass got stranded on Thunder Island in some sort of Blue Lagoon type thang and just banged like rabbits. Well, the other day at work, my co-hort Jeff Hill disagreed with these findings. The following transcript is what followed (Please Note: Vampiro is Vampire Weekend):

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:05 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

And you call yourself a music fan. That’s child’s play.

From: Jacob Eickholt
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:06 PM
To: Hill, Jeffrey
Subject: RE:

Kids are the ones who don’t hold the infamous Vampiro in high regard…

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:09 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

Adolescent minds are the ones who put Vampiro up on a pedestal. I put some effort in and gave them a listen with an open mind. I just didn’t feel them except for 1 track.

From: Jacob Eickholt
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:10 PM
To: Hill, Jeffrey
Subject: RE:

And their cover of ‘I’m Going Down’.

I can’t believe you don’t like ‘Eye In The Sky’ by the Alan Parsons Project btw…

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:14 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

My bad, they have two good songs. That was a good cover.

It’s an epic journey that I want no part of. The most epic journey I can be a part of is with my man Jay Ferguson out on Thunder Island.From: Jacob Eickholt

Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:15 PM
To: Hill, Jeffrey
Subject: RE:

They also have a killer cover of “Everywhere” by Fleetwood Mac as well…as well as most of their songs.

That is a very epic journey. As a kid I always felt like he was accidentally stranded there, and that it was a very similar situation to Brooke Shields on Blue Lagoon.

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:18 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

I wouldn’t know about that cover.

Oh he wanted to be out on that beach. I look at it like Leo getting a secret map to go out on a beautiful paradise where only the beautiful ones are welcome like in the hit film ‘The Beach’.

From: Jacob Eickholt
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:22 PM
To: Hill, Jeffrey
Subject: RE:

You should.

Are you sure? I like that theory but were there other people on that beach too? I feel it was just them and they passed the hours without number, then escaped and had to say goodbye to the island.

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:28 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

It was just him and his boo out on that island. The severe weather brought them closer together and their relationship grew stronger after leaving Thunder Island.

From: Jacob Eickholt
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:30 PM
To: Hill, Jeffrey
Subject: RE:

Who are you, a romance novel writer? It was a dude and some chick brought together by circumstance, and all they did was discover each others company and never talk again after leaving that magical island.

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 2:45 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

Jay Ferguson was a gentleman sir! I will not sit here and allow you to drag his good name through the mud.

From: Jacob Eickholt
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 3:47 PM
To: Hill, Jeffrey
Subject: RE:

He was no such thing. An amazing tunesmith, yes he was. He was similar to my styles…

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 4:02 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

He may have been running around before but that island changed him. After the storm he realized just how sacred life is. He realized that if he could conquer everything that Thunder Island threw at him, he could conquer anything else in life. That island made him a better person.

From: Jacob Eickholt
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 4:05 PM
To: Hill, Jeffrey
Subject: RE:

You need help. PS I am going to publish this as a transcript on my blog.

And life is not sacred…

From: Hill, Jeffrey
Sent: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 4:10 PM
To: Jacob Eickholt
Subject: RE:

If Jay Ferguson still tours and if he ever comes to Minneapolis, we are so getting front row tix.

An Ode To A Sammich

I had just gone record shopping
I bought some Cheap Trick and some Icehouse, maybe some fiddy cent a-ha
Denny's beckoned, I needed you inside me
I sat alone, ordered a Diet Coke and You
You were more carbs than even this seasoned eater could take
Glistening with cheddar, mayo, more cheddar, and gravy
Like a poorer man's Poutine
One time was enough, but I will never forget our nooner
Denny's Midwestern Meat and Potatoes Sandwich

Old School Video of the Day "----------" by ________

I can't name this post or mention the artist for certain reasons beyond my control...but I can speak in codes about them.

Today ended a four day week where I almost put in 40 hours. I was all amped up for a night of drinking, but I got a migraine. Plus, the Twins are getting spanked hard. Then I went on YouTube, and I saw this:



Holy shit, watching this is like slamming a Full Throttle and snorting a pixy stick. Look at that energy! And it's on the Grammys, and this artist was killing it. One of the top five ever to get in the music game, at the top of their powers, proving the title of the song more than apt. And even the drummer gets some.

If you don't find this amazing, I can't fathom how we could be friends. I also can't fathom how you could like music, the color purple, entertainment, humanity or life itself.

Old School Video of the Day "In These Arms" by Bon Jovi

MTV turned 30 today. Think about that for a second...

Today's video is by a band that probably wouldn't have been huge without MTV. Sure, some of Bon Jovi's singles may have cracked radio in the pre-video days, but MTV made the group mega stars. I mean, Dokken rocked harder and had better singles (well, pre "Slippery When Wet") but no one remembers "Breaking The Chains" the same way they remember comparable Bon Jovi fare like "In and Out of Love" and "Runaway".



And guess what? Yep, it's a concert video. I honestly cannot remember a Bon Jovi video that is non-concert. Well, maybe that "Livin On A Prayer" remake they did called "It's My Life" but I think they may have even been on stage in that. Also, please note that this is from the JBJ era where he thought he was going to be an ACTORRRR and trimmed his Aqua Net perfect mane for a quasi-lesbian joint. (Maybe that is why this only cracked the top 30?).

Anyways, this song is probably my favorite work by the group that isn't called "Bad Medicine" or came off of "Slippery When Wet". I recently found the 45 for this one in a stack I hadn't gone through in a while and I have been bumping it on the reg. Brings back warm childhood memories of Ghost in the Graveyard and watching Studs.

IHOP Ad - 1969

I love chain breakfast places. On my totem pole of diners that I go to when hungover, fucked up, or after a concert, IHOP comes in 3rd (behind Perkins and Denny's). After seeing this very unsettling ad from the late 60's, I may have to drop the HOP off my list (NOTE: Watch at your own risk).



Whoa. Not only is the creepy balloon family scary enough for Wes Carpenter to make a series of lackluster films around, they have to go and add THAT SONG! It's like Alvin and those Chipmunks hit the nitrous and recorded this bad boy while channeling Alister Crowley.

And the food! That salad looks like something my mom made on one of her heath food kicks in the 80s. The meatballs look plastic. Strangely though, the Rooty Tooty Fresh and Fruity looks almost as you get it in the restaurant. And what the fuck is with that weird chicken dish the little girl gets?

After forays into the ad game like this, it boggles the mind that the International House of Pancakes is still around today.

Old School Video of the Day "Hands To Heaven" by Breathe

I have a confession to make: I love this song. I bump this fucking song in my car and sing the words like I just broke up with the love of my life. Sometimes, I do very non heterosexual hand motions to the part where the lead singer sings "Toniiiiiigh I need your sweet caress". For some reason, this song reaffirms my will to live on really shitty days. Shit, I think this may be the SECOND time I have written a blog about this song in the last five years.



There was an article I read years ago that said this was Simon Cowell's favorite song. I remember the overall tone of the quote made it seem like Simon Cowell was a total douche for loving "Hands To Heaven", but I can totally see why he does. The song is nearly perfect, from the swooning vocals/sax combo to the vague ass lyrics that describe having to leave in the morning but wanting to play buck-buck that night. And (probably most important to Cowell) it moved an assload of singles in 1988, reaching #2 on the Hot 100.

So I'm gonna scream it from the rooftops. "Hands To Heaven" may be emotional pap, but it's WONDERFUL emotional pap.

Old School Video of the Day "Freak Like Me" by Adina Howard

Oh man, did I hate this song when it was originally out. I'm not sure why, I think it was the "boom boom" part. Just say it Adina, say "fuck". Even a 13 year old white boy in the burbs knew what you were talking about.



Strangely, the other day this came on at work (the production crew bumps a lot of the Billboard Top 100 year end lists) and I sort of liked it. It sounds about 100 times better than most of the shit that's out on Top 40, and it cracked me up that my co-worker felt the need to talk about Adina Howard's ass being "mad on point".

So throw on your flannel or your Girbauds, maybe crack a Zima, and cool out to the booty jam of the summer of 1995. Shit, this song is now legal to drive...

Give Me a Leonard Cohen Afterworld So I Can Sigh Eternally

The new issue of Spin arrived today. Kurt Cobain was on the cover, which didn't strike me as odd (due to Spin putting Old Saint Kurdt on the cover what seems like annually). Odd didn't describe the feeling that struck me. The feeling felt more like a creeping sadness. You see, the mag was pimping the 20th anniversary of Nevermind. And that made me feel really old, and as an extension of this oldness, it made me feel irrelevant.

Nevermind dropped on September 24th, 1991. I was almost 9. The album didn't enter my conscious mind until sometime in the next Spring, when the local top 40 station KDWB started playing "Smells Like Teen Spirit" sandwiched in between Michael Bolton and Arrested Development joints. I liked it, but I also liked "Warm It Up" by Kris Kross and "The First Time" by Surface. There was no filter, it was just another pop song.

Nirvana didn't really resonate for me until right before the release of In Utero in the Fall of 1993. By then, I had started qualifying genres and realized I liked the rock music first, the rap second, and all the other shitty pop third. The Friday before the release of In Utero, MTV ran a special episode of 120 Minutes where they played all the videos Nirvana ever did in chronological order (and, for some reason, "It's The End of the World As We Know It" by R.E.M). When I saw the "In Bloom" video air after the two songs I knew off Nevermind (SLTS and "Come As You Are") I was fucking hooked.

The video appealed to my nostalgia (yes, even at 11 I was nostalgic)with it's faux Ed Sullivan setting, and my sense of weird (holy shit, those dudes are wearing dresses and breaking shit!). Oh, and it rocked. I knew that I would have to buy Nevermind when I actually got some money of my own.

I didn't actually buy the CD until after Kurt Cobain died. It was, however, amongst the first four CDs I bought with my own money from the BMG Music Service (also Aerosmith Pump and Permanent Vacation, and August and Everything After by The Counting Crows). Nevermind didn't disappoint. It was the first CD I actually listened to the whole way though (usually I listened once, picked the singles and songs I liked, and skipped the filler) and it was the first CD where I studied the liner notes intently. It was also taken away from me by my dad for a while, due to my brothers reporting me for the picture of Kurt flicking off the camera on the inner sleeve.

To say that Nevermind was one of the moments that changed my view of popular culture is not an understatement. It was the first piece of entertainment that I loved that was both sort of outsider AND mainstream. It taught me to give the whole album a chance, goddammit, because a "Drain You" might be lurking amidst all that filler. And it conditioned my ears to the kind of verse, chorus, verse soft loud shit that would blow my mind later on (The Pixies Doolittle was a big influence on the group).

Sadly, Nevermind belongs to my generation, and our grip on pop culture is slipping away. There are probably 10 year old kids out there right now hearing the new Foo Fighters album who have no clue Dave Grohl was in another band. It seems a lot of the shit that blew my mind back in the day has lost it's punch. Clerks was the first movie I ever saw that had my sense of humor, and with every shitty movie Kevin Smith makes, Clerks dies a little. Same goes for the rebels of my era. Ice Cube was a scary, scary motherfucker (who y'all loved to hate) and now he makes family films. Charles Barkley was the most bad ass dude on the court not named Michael Jordan, and now he's a joke machine (who still entertains, but he HAS been a role model to up and coming announcers).

The older I get, the more out of touch I seem to be with whatever the fuck is it. I don't get Affliction and Ed Hardy and shit (well, I GET it being ridiculous) and I probably never will. Same goes for things like Twilight...I mean, really? Sparkly werewolves or whatever? I try to get it, but I just don't. There was a time where I would actually understand why people liked something, now it escapes me. And this makes me feel like, to quote a sort of modern artist, I'm Losing My Edge.

Guess Who's Back? Back Again...

Hey there. Did you miss me?

Sorry about the lack of execution on my part. I have had a hellacious last month and a half. I got promoted at work into a Project Manager role, which requires a lot of work both on and off the clock, and I didn't want to cut into my precious drinking time. So I cut back on the blogging.

What ELSE have I done on my summer vacay, you ask? Well, I have played a lot of softball. I bought some vinyl, and I saw some movies. Yes, I actually watched some films (The Box with Cameron Diaz was by far the worst, the new X-Men was kick ass, and Going the Distance with Drew Barrymore in sort of cute mode was surprisingly decent).

Overall, this has been a weird ass summer. It IS summer (my sexy ass tanned hide and the full blast AC can attest to that) but it doesn't FEEL like summer. The All Star game sucked ass. There hasn't been an epic summer song yet (LMFAO can kiss my ass with that "Party Rockers in the house" shit). The Twinkies are partying like it's 1999 (really, where is Pat Meares?). And Will Smith hasn't dropped some visual comfort food on our movie going laps. 2K11 is fucking off, man.

Fortunately, there are some cabin getaways planned in the next couple of weeks. I am going to use the Southhaven City drunken street dance as my summer coming out party, with any times in Indian Country later in the season as proof of my reign. So rejoice, because the summer needs to start soon. And even if it doesn't, I'm back like MJ in the 45.

Norm Sucks (Even 18 Years Later)

While searching for something else online today, I came across this old Sports Illustrated article about Norm Green moving the North Stars out of Minnesota in 1993. It's funny how much something like this can open up old wounds.

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1138154/1/index.htm

My family went to quite a few games at the old Met Center per year. I'm not one of those people who claims to have been at a shit ton of games and not actually attended, I was there. Hell, one time my dad and I drove in a blizzard to watch the Stars play the Maple Leafs with about 500 other people. I also witnessed many a fight between Blackhawks and Stars fans in the parking lot. It was pretty enjoyable to watch grown men chant "Secord Sucks" drunk off their ass on Stroh's at 3 PM on a January Sunday afternoon.

Hockey was my #2 sport to watch behind baseball. After the Stars left, I really can't get into it. Sure, we have the Wild. But their style of hockey is just so goddamned boring. Plus, they somehow have the highest payroll in the league and not one discernible star. Oh, and they choke almost every time they are on national TV.

Even though Norm Green is like 75 years old now, I would probably not hesitate to verbally assault him if I saw him in public. To this day, I am shocked some crack pot, blue collar Stars fan didn't do much more than chant "Norm Sucks".

K-O-B-E I L-O-V-E You!!!

The title of this post is a fallacy. I hate Kobe Bean Bryant. I have hated him since he took Brandy and her stupid little Moesha dreads to prom. This off season, when Lebron broke my heart and decided to be a spastic 8 year old named Toddy and play with his special friends in Bullshit Little Havana Candyland, I thought I could begrudgingly like Kobe and late Lebron.

I was wrong. Wrong as all Hell.

For you see, my Kobe hate runs deep. Kobe is like some sort of emotionless perfect basketball God who plays the game like most people go to work (which makes the title of his documentary Kobe Doin Work all the more realistic). He has basketball Aspbeger's. When he tries to show emotion, we get this:



That is the same face my roommate's Boxer makes. Jordan had the intense tongue, Shaq looked at his hand in disbelief, and Kobe B. Bryant makes a doggie face.

So you can imagine my glee when Kobe and his "friends" failed yesterday. The Lakers were not at all deserving of another run. Phil Jackson can retire to Montana and boff his fine ass bosses daughter, Ron Artest can do typically awesome shit that Ron Artest does (dodgeball, laser tag), Derek Fisher can be the only Laker player I don't hate, and Kobe can continue to fulfill his lifelong goal of being the Sultan of Brunei's 34th wife:



Enjoy the off season Kobe. I am sure you will do it with absolutely no feeling, emotion, or any other sort of human characteristic.

The Start of Summer (Jake Eickholt Version)

Yesterday was one of my favorite days of the year, a day I use to mark the start of the summer (aka outdoor drinking, grilling and lawn dart season). Yesterday was the Bryn Mawr Garage Sale.

There is nothing better than scoping out the crazy crap people like to sell at Bryn Mawr. The best thing for sale this year was a 1964 Volkswagen Beetle for $4000 or best offer. My compatriots in garage sailing suggested I offer up the Focus for a straight trade, but I informed them that the Eickholt Fam had a Beetle when I was a child and it was a piece of shit. Too bad, because I am sure a vintage Beetle would be a total chick magnet.

The second best item was either a framed sketch of FDR or a huge ass framed poster of N*SYNC era Justin Timberlake. Unfortunately, neither one of them fit my manchild bedroom decor. The sketch would totally clash with my Pope John Paul II record, and the Timberlake poster just wouldn't go well with the DJ Hero case in the corner of the room.

My main focus of the sale, as usual, was recorded music. There wasn't a lot of LPs this year (save for the usual Johnny Mathis and My Fair Lady bullshit one always finds at garage sales). Fortunately, there were tons of CDs. And since the residents of Bryn Mawr are all either 30 something gay couples or sexy yoga pants hipster chicks with awesome tits, I scored some awesome finds. Behold:

Flood - They Might Be Giants
True Colours - Split Enz
The Two Tone Singles Collection
Jacksonville City Nights - Ryan Adams
Shenanigans - Green Day
Pure Rock Fury - Clutch
That Lonesome Song - Jamey Johnson
Peace and Love - The Pogues
Listen Like Thieves - INXS
God, Ween, Satan - Ween

Total cost: 11 bucks. I also grabbed three VHS tapes of Earthworm Jim and Animaniacs cartoons from a "Free-Take My Stuff" table. Oh, and I stuffed my fat face with Fast Freddie's pizza and Cheese Curds. A fantastic day, capped with a softball practice later that afternoon and an evening spent drinking Jeremiah Weed and Facebook friend requesting people I probably shouldn't have.

The Summer of 2K11 looks like it's gonna be rad.

PS - I totally forgot this INXS song existed before bumping Listen Like Thieves after the sales. INXS was a totally awesome college rock band before they got all 'Suicide Blonde' on our asses.

Goin' To Kansas City, Kansas City Here I Come

This past weekend marked the annual trip to see the Twins play outside of MPLS. The destination this season was Kansas City. I was to KC once before when I was 14 and I recall it being a steaming dump full of crumbling factories and Hyper Wal-Marts. Therefore, my main excitement for this trip was seeing the renovated Kauffman Stadium. Fortunately, the city did not disappoint. Unlike the Twins themselves.

The MPLS Wreckin' Crew rolled into KC around 3 PM and promptly found a QuikTrip from which to procure Boulevard Ale and Rollergrill food (the Popeye's Po Boy ingested for breakfast didn't quite cut it). After many Boulevards, a cab was taken to the "new" Kauffman Stadium. A few friends were also in town for the series, so the Crew decided to meet them in our half full section (they had seats in an adjoining section). This proved fruitless, as a spinsteress usher dubbed "The Twins Hunter" shooed them away from the empty seats (the same usher chastised us the following day for "possibly cursing" as a Royals fan dumped a tub of popcorn on himself while almost passing out in our section). So instead of sitting in the seats, walking around commenced posthaste. Twenty Ounce Margaritas called "Royal-Ritas" were consumed. Cheesecake Factory was eaten at 1AM. Oh, and the Twins lost because Drew Butera sucked at baseball that night.



On Saturday I ate this sex bomb. It was from a BBQ place called Oklahoma Joe's in a gas station. The Crew waited in line for the BBQ for an hour and a half. It was the most amazing sandwich ever, containing Provolone, two onion rings and brisket. It was better than any sex I've had recently, which has been none.

One similarity between Kansas City and MPLS is that they both have Half Price Books. So, a Half Price Books mini tour was undertaken. There was a LOT more Jazz records at HPB in MO/KS, and that just ain't my bag, baby. So I focused on the usual and purchased Otis Redding "Live In Europe", Queen "A Day at the Races", the George Duke album with 'Dukey Stick' for 50 cents, and Al Green "Explores Your Mind". And also an Archies album (which kicks ass). Total cost was about 15 bones.

Game two was started off with some Summer Shandy's (KC is a pretty fantastic beer town too) in the lot, followed by a whole lot of shitty baseball. Alex Gordon channeled George Brett finally, and Joe Nathan channeled me in 1999 when I could no longer throw my fastball in Babe Ruth League, and the Twins shamed themselves. On the way out, a nice young KC lass came over to chat with the Crew and all was going swimmingly until the lasses BFF puked on a bench.

Once the hotel was reached, there were no parking spots to speak of. This made the Crew angry, and dampened the plan to go clubbing. Fortunately, there were frat boys from K-State and Mizzou in the parking lot discussing how much coke they had. This (coupled with a loving Full Nelson executed on a sorority sister by one of the K-State gents) lightened the mood quite a bit. Of course, the Crew does not sniff the coke, so the hotel room was retired to where the passing out could commence.

Kansas City was not the same old dump I went to in 1997. The whole place was clean (even the ghetto paths traversed to the stadium), and the people were very friendly (save for some drunken bags at the stadium). Overall, a grand vacay to start this summer season off right.