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I’m in Nashville, TN right now helping coordinate flood relief efforts. Nashville is a city of vintage neon signs, cowboys and country music. A city whose pulse can be felt in the beat of the kick drum from any number of bars in downtown…where going to karaoke is no fun because everyone who gets up to sing sounds like they have a couple of CMA’s on their shelves at home. (that’s country music awards for those not in the know).
But I’m not going to talk about the hats and boots…I’m here to recount an amazing story that will passed down from father-to-son as one of the greatest pseudo-sport achievements of all time.
one night while exploring the downtown area we came upon a bar with a quintessential aspect of cowboy culture…or quasi-urban cowboy culture: the mechanical bull. tucked in the corner of a bar that had an overpowering stench of bleach (it was it’s first night open since the flood) lay the bull–waiting to be broken.
I had no intention of riding said bull but was “roped” into it as someone else in our party didn’t want to be the only one to make a fool of themselves. Having rid myself of shame years ago I happily agreed to test my mettle against the metalic beast from hell. So i signed the waiver, paid my fee and contemplated what the next few minutes would hold. Because i’m slightly retarded i immediately start thinking about John Travolta in ‘Urban Cowboy’ and how I don’t have a hat, tight jeans or even a stormy relationship to bolster my performance…i would have to rely on the one thing that has gotten me through many a tough situation–heart.
before I knew it I was throwing my leg over the hydrolic beast, doing my best Luke Perry impression ala ’8 seconds’ I raised my hand and signaled my readiness to begin the dance.
…I could try to explain what happened next, but words would fail to capture my display of raw athleticism. I did so well that even a few of the old salty dogs at the bar shed a tear and tipped their hats out of respect.
now I’m not one to tell a tale er nuthin…but shucks–I sure beat the hide off that bull…i swear ta god i did.
i may have won the battle…but this war is far from over…
Apparently a blog should have a theme, a thread running through every post tying it back to the heart of the matter…in reading my posts, i do not, and I’m ok with it. My life is random, I’m random ergo, my blog is random….and continuing in that same vein…
Music. I love music. I love everything about it and can find redeeming qualities in most genres…i come from a musical family, although both my parents are decidedly handicapped in this area, not being able to carry a tune but they love it as well. My Dad has a record collection that must have been the envy of everyone back when vinyl was the new ipad…and now he has a CD collection that, no joke must be 1000 strong…and it’s all over the place…it’s great. My mom, she has the rhythm and likes to rock out…I can remember listening to the Pointer Sisters ‘Jump in’ back in the day, dancing around like a fool…Steve Winwood, Roxette, Paul Simon’s Graceland…just incredible stuff.
Then there are my brothers: Seth and Josh. Both musical. Seth is a musician, he plays slaps da bass for a living and does so quite well: www.sethsbase.com He was there to introduce me to Parliament and to buy me Dr. Dre’s ‘Da Chronic…’ a debt of gratitude I may never be able to repay.
Josh, well he’s been a bit of a mystery in terms of his musical tastes…I think he’s kinda all over the place, like me.
But we can all sing, and did so throughout high school and into college and we all like to do it.
Music continued to be a big part of my life while I lived in NYC, I had a couple blogs that would give me the dirt on who was playing where and introduce me to new music…and then when I lost a steady routine my thirst for ‘the new’ or different kinda fizzled. i still sing…not as much…and i definitely don’t go out and see enough live music. Which is funny because every time I go to a show, afterwards I feel a little more alive, a little happier, it’s weird…but music is definitely a part of my life that I have been neglecting and I think its high time to feed that side again…
so in that spirit here is a group called Pomplamoose. The name just makes them all the cooler in my eyes. i’m not sure if these two are dating, married, just good friends or what…but they work so well together. She has a sexy voice…think smokey bar lounge-esque and he can play anything and I pretty much want to be his friend. They exist solely on the interwebs, rarely performing live and are magnificent.
http://www.youtube.com/user/PomplamooseMusic
Take some time and explore…you’ll be happy you did. they also have solo projects which are pretty kickass…I particularly like Jack’s…gulf song is so very sweet. Again, would like to be his friend.
so yeah, I heart music. i think it’s pretty rad..and I think this might become a new “theme” for my blog to weave amongst the other randomness that is my life.
night.
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Since coming back from Iowa at the end of April I got to spend too short a time in San Francisco with Claire…it’s the part of my job I like the least…and by that I don’t mean seeing my girlfriend (I love that part), but how it can be infrequent. The sporadic nature of Disaster Response is exciting and maddening at times. The daily grind doesn’t really exist in my world and that can mean that I’m hanging in San Fran for a month or two or, as in the case of this year, I’m barely there. But we made the best of it before I left around 2 weeks later to go to a Conference. Bill (my “boss” ) and I presented at the: National Voluntary Organizations Active In Disaster Conference…I haven’t been that nervous in a long time but everything went really well…I met a lot of great people and learned a little more about myself: I’m not so good at schmoozing…I know I can talk to people but when the setting is designed to foster that sort of activity I freeze up. I had a lot of awkward conversations with people…it was great. In addition to learning more about what makes me awesome (or not in this case) I noticed that we (Bill and myself) were some of the youngest people at this conference by 20ish years…interesting.
so yeah…it went really well and I believe lots of good opportunities to prove how capable we are as an organization will come out of it…starting….NOW!
From the conference we went straight to Nashville, TN where we are currently setting up a work flow coordination project to help the groups on the ground be more effective and get more done for the people who were flooded out a few weeks ago…should be good.
So yeah, that’s the update: I’m working a lot and living in a church again.
ok, so now onto the other piece of goodness…they’re called pomplamoose…check them out on youtube–they rule.
