Dear Friends,
Yesterday we got back in the saddle and went for the 5AM walk. I am so thankful that we did. There is a lot that I miss about my time with Tom and Quentin when we don’t go for the walk.
The walk is around the neighborhood, and it goes for about four miles, give or take. Lately, it’s been like a walk in two parts, and I get to have two very cool conversations. The first half I get to talk mostly with Tom and then the second half has typically just been Quentin and I as Tom gets his back into fighting shape.
There is wisdom possessed by the two of them that I love, and I have grown to really cherish this time together. I look forward to the day when Tom feels good enough to go the whole route, of course, but until that day returns, I will dig each half of the journey.
The best part is there is never any shortage of conversation. Everyone should be so lucky. If the whole world had someone to just talk with, laugh with, commiserate with, and decompress with, it would be a much nicer place.
*****
Yesterday one of my students called me an idiot.
I really didn’t expect it from this class, but this particular kid really wants to be a tough guy. He’s one of the “no dad” crew and they often have a chip on their shoulder. I’ve seen his type, sadly, a hundred or more times before.
It did throw me for a loop for a bit.
Every week I have a different theme for the images I put into my math presentations. This week has been sports equipment. Today’s first slide had a big picture of a baseball and when I put it on the screen, I said, “This, of course, is a soccer ball.”
Most of the class laughed, but this one boy said, “Idiot.”
I heard it, too, but it took a second for it to register. I had to say, “Did someone just say, ‘idiot?’” The fingers all pointed to NoDaddy Jones. I was pretty sure he had said it, too.
Maybe “NoDaddy Jones” is mean…I don’t know. I can’t say his real name, obviously, but it is just a moniker like “Cocaine Baby.” On a side note, I saw Cocaine Baby the other day and he’s doing pretty well. His homeroom teacher confirmed as much, too, so that made me happy.
Anyway, the kid was not remorseful at all and I really wanted to tear into him, but I thought better of it and just sent him to the nice gal who handles such things. I never send her people, for the most part, but I figured I would put a little distance between myself and this kid. Clearly, he was having a bad day.
He’s going to lose a few recesses for this and some privileges that he has enjoyed. I wanted there to be instant repercussions because this is a kid who, potentially, is going to have his mouth write a few checks that he’s not going to be able to cash. I want him to learn that consequences can be swift.
Fair, but swift.
This could be an interesting story. The nice lady who disciplined him brought him back and he apologized, but it wasn’t sincere. He admitted as much, later on, when he asked me for a privilege, and I said “no.” It will be interesting to see which version of him shows up today.
Life goes on and it is a new day.
*****
As a huge Dead Kennedy’s fan, the posthumous release of Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death was an incredible gift. I never got to see the band play live, but having this record (at first on cassette) was a pretty close second. I wore that thing out, too.
The alternative versions of some of the songs on here are well worth the price of admission. “Buzzbomb from Pasadena” is the last song on the record, but this version always cracks me up. Jello Biafra sings it as if he is some geriatric murderer behind the wheel of a killer car. While the original version is great, I tend to prefer the one on Give Me Convenience or Give Me Death.
The record is a great collection of the Dead Kennedys doing what the band did best. “Police Truck,” which has been covered so many times, sounds fresh and bad ass here as it flows right into “Too Drunk to Fuck.” The latter of those two was never my favorite song by the band, but it sounds great here, too.
“California Uber Alles” has Ted’s original drum beat at the start and sounds really good here. I’m a fan, of course, of the late DH Peligro, but Ted’s beat here is sofa king good. I’m a big fan of “The Man with the Dogs,” too. East Bay Ray’s guitar part on that one is over the top.
When I listen to the Dead Kennedys I am always blown away by how they put the songs together. Everybody in the band brought their A game, of course, but the songs are just arranged so tightly, too. They make me very jealous.
“Insight” reminds me of being a teenager. I thought this song was speaking for all the kids everywhere who were attacked for being different. I had my own brushes with people wanting to fight me because of the way I dressed or wore my hair. Biafra was always one to point this stupid shit out.
“Life Sentence” and “A Child and His Lawnmower” are not the greatest songs, but they are still way better than Guns N’ Roses. I do kind of like “A Child and His Lawnmower,” though. It holds down the fort for “Holiday in Cambodia.”
This is a good version of “Holiday in Cambodia,” I suppose. I’m not sure I have ever heard a bad version of the song except for the one time I heard the new singer do it on a video. Yuck. The cover of “I Fought the Law” is a great fun, though. I’ve been enjoying it for quite a while.
“Saturday Night Holocaust” is the b-side for “Halloween” and is a fine song, but it pales in comparison to my favorite track on the record. The one-off “Pull My Strings” from the 1980 B.A.M. awards show is fucking great. I played this one at least a thousand times as a teenager.
“When I’m rich and meet Bob Hope/We’ll shoot some golf and shoot some dope” is maybe my all-time favorite Biafra lyric. You can kind of hear the groans of the audience at certain parts of the song and it is glorious. Biafra took the piss out of the music establishment that spring 1980 evening and it’s one of the most punk rock things I have ever heard.
Outside of the great version of “Buzzbomb from Pasadena,” the rest of the record is tame in comparison to “Pull My Strings.” I guess “Straight A’s” is pretty decent. It’s a cool riff and one of the early songs that was done by original member 6025. “The Prey” is still quite timely but not super fun to listen to and Biafra’s story of getting chased by rich kids in a life size Hot Wheels car is funny the first ten times you hear it, but not so much after that.
This record is worth getting just for “Pull My Strings” but there are also great versions of other DK classics.
*****
See you tomorrow.
When AI gets rich and meets Bob Hope, they'll shoot some golf and shoot some dope.
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