Daddy and the Dude(s)

Brendan Mackey's Blog is proud to announce the signing of Luke William Mackey to a lucrative long-term contract.

Just like in the NBA where the latest trend is pairing superstars to form a Big 3 (a la the Boston Celtics, Miami Heat, and NY Knicks), our team has added another dude.

There was some concern within the organization that the two dude's talents wouldn't properly mesh and there would be fights over the the binky.

Sure, things might get a little shaky in the beginning, especially with such a short preseason, but ultimately, we feel that raw talent will win out.

Luke William, via his agent, is quoted as saying, "Though I had a lot of tempting offers, it was always my dream to become a Mackey and through hard work and a lot of sleeping, eating, and pooping, I hope to prove my worth to my teammates and Mackey fans, who are the greatest fans in the world."

2012 will be an exciting year for our team, and with Luke William in the fold, we think we can go all the way this year.

Happy New Year!

Fixing the Housing Crisis

They say the market's bad, but I think the time has never been more right to build your own house.

Gumdrops add to resale value.

Or I can always flip this house.

And if I make a nice profit, that's icing.

Forget the house, I'm just going to concentrate on this icing.

The Dude vs. Santa

As ever parent knows, one of the most terrifying things you can inflict on your child is taking them to see Santa.

Here's how it went...

Daddy: Hey, Dude. Do you want to see Santa?
Dude: Sure, Daddy, that sounds super fun. Can we wait in line for an hour and half too? Because that is something I love to do.

Daddy: Okay, here's the deal. You're going to get up there and sit on that bearded old stranger's lap and say, "Merry Christmas!" And then you can tell him that you want a choo-choo train for Christmas.
Dude: Choo-choo train!
Daddy: Perfect. Then we'll want you stare at all the different cameras at the same time and smile. This is important, okay.
Dude: Don't worry about it, Daddy. It ain't no thing but a chicken wing. I got this.

Dude: HOLY CRAP!!!! WHAT IS GOING ON???? WHO IS THAT MAN???? HE'S GOING TO HAUNT MY DREAMS!!!! GET ME OUT OF HERE!!!!
Daddy: Someone, get this kid a candy cane, stat!

Dude: Okay, high five, Santa. We're cool.

As LL Cool J said, "Don't call it a comeback."

Jaws Two

                              Neighborhood opens their doors to trick-or-treaters.

Sharks in the neighborhood.

Our Shark.

We're going to need a bigger boat.

When he comes at ya, doesn't seem to be living... until he bites ya, and those black eyes roll over white and then... ah then you hear that terrible high-pitched screamin'.

 Happy Halloween from a candy eating, pumpkin carving machine!

 

Hey, I Just Read That

The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach.

The most hyped novel this fall (that is before Jeffrey Eugenides had a frickin’ billboard in Times Square for The Marriage Plot) deserves all the accolades and buzz it gets. Though I have to admit that the monster advance and Harbach’s (an editor at lit journal n+1) constellation of Big Six Publishing connections as detailed in the now-infamous Vanity Fair article by friend (of course) Keith Gessen would make any aspiring novelist grit their teeth and shake their fist at the sky.

Set at Wetish College, a fictional Division III liberal arts college in Wisconsin, it tells the story of hard-working prodigy shortstop Henry Skrimshander who loses his ability to make simple throws to first base (a la Steve Blass/Chuck Knoblauch et al.) and the effect it has on the lives and loves of his mentor and team catcher Mike Schwartz (Swartzy!), his suave roommate Owen Dunne, Wetish president and Herman Melville scholar Guert Affenlight and his daughter the beautiful Pella Affenlight.

Critics have been bending over backwards to point out that the novel is “about more than just baseball, it’s about life” (which is code for women, who make up like ninety percent of fiction readers, will like it too). And it’s true, but really, IT IS a book about baseball and that’s why it’s so enjoyable. A lot of the “literary” aspects and plot points, though well done, aren’t anything you haven’t seen before in a campus novel.

In fact, I can imagine Michael Chabon reading it and checking his computer to see if this wasn’t some manuscript buried in his hard drive. 1. Baseball-check 2. Themes of male friendship-check 3. A messed up college faculty member-check 4. An out-of-left-field gay affair-check 5. The ordinary elevated to the level of mythic- check. 6. Over 500 pages-check. 7.  A character named Phlox- check! 8. A baseball hitting a spectator changes the course of everyone’s lives- okay, that’s John Irving.

But that’s just me being snarky, because I loved and read the hell out of this book. And as a former little league shortstop, I got the cold shivers just thinking about the dreaded throwing “yips” that Henry suffers from.

To sum up, in conclusion, restating my original thesis, I liked the book better than Bernard Malamud’s The Natural which I read this year, but not as much as Matt Christopher’s The Kid Who Only Hit Homers which I read when I was nine.

I’d give you a more detailed review, but dude, I’ve got my own book to write (see the upper corner of the blog to track my progress).

Let’s Plug It Out

Welcome back to On the Bald Spot, where this week we’re mourning the end of HBO’s brotastic show Entourage (Spoiler Alert- everything worked out in the end).

Over the show’s eight season run, viewers have tuned in to luxuriate in the unfettered wealth, the style, the celebrity, the wooden acting, the occasional nudity, but here at On the Bald Spot, we had our eyes trained and our jeweler’s loops ready for only one thing each week: Jeremy Piven’s hair.

For a postmortem on super agent Ari Gold’s ever-changing pate, we’re lucky to have celebrity blogger and noted wigologist Jeffrey Wolinski.

Brendan: Jeremy Piven had one of the great hair turnarounds to modern Hollywood history. He was a relatively obscure balding actor with bit parts in his Chicago buddy John Cusack’s films like Say Anything, occasional film cult success like PCU or the short-lived TV show Cupid. But on Entourage, he showed up with a full head of hair and nobody seemed to question it? How did he engineer this hair comeback story?

Jeff: In the beginning, it was just the good old comb over or comb forward.  I'm sure he went the topical solutions route. He then graduated to pieces. These are just mere rug samples that you carefully plot the empty parts of your scalp.

Brendan: Tuning in this season, I noticed that the Piven’s wig work was getting a little ragged. What happened?

Jeff: My sources tell me that Piven started to go gray.  Now, he had to combine the hairpieces AND the hair dye. This is a balancing act because he now has to match his pieces to the color of the hair dye or vice versa.

Brendan: A very tricky tight rope act indeed.

Jeff: Then later on he lost too much hair for the hairpieces to latch on to so he had to go the surgery route. The surgery route has been an ongoing process for the past 10 years. This is a simple procedure where they remove hair from the back of your head and re-plant it on the top of your head.

Brendan: So what went wrong?

Jeff: I think Piven waited too long for this procedure and he doesn't have enough good hair to replace the ones that left his head. So even with the transplanted hair, he still has to wear rug samples to fill in the blanks PLUS break out the chemistry set to create a hair dye that perfectly matches both! Not to mention his DYE BROWS!  I'm tired just thinking about it.

Brendan: Lloyd, get me Empire Carpet on phone!

Jeff (singing): 588-2300, Em-pire!

Brendan: I noticed in a couple bedroom scenes this season that Ari had a perfectly shaved chest. Do you think he was harvesting his chest hair for replanting on his head?

Jeff: Piven is nothing if not a resourceful actor, so it would follow that he wouldn’t let any good hair go to waste. But, the chest to hair technology is still in developmental stages (in a lab in Robin William’s basement).

Brendan: Do you think there’s any deep-seeded psychologically issues at work here concerning Piven and his hair?

Jeff: I know that long time friends Piven and John Cusack have had a bit of a “falling out”, and I believe it’s about the “falling out” of their hair. I truly think that Piven is jealous of Cusack b/c of his hair. Not that it’s b/c Cusack has perfect hair; we all know that is not the case.

Brendan: Lloyd Dobler? Say it isn’t so!

Jeff: Yes it’s true! Mr. Cusack has a hair-raising secret too!

Brendan: Maybe his hair went back in a Hot Tub Time Machine?

Jeff: No, that is factually inaccurate. Just like Piven, Cusack has had the surgical procedures and bathed his head in the oil-filled Gulf of Mexico BUT Cusack was able to ward off the unforgivable follicle loss until later in life when the technology and money was there. This is the true reason why Piven and Cusack, once best friends, are now just mere acquaintances.

The documentation of this demise between two old friends can be seen in the underrated comedy from the 1980s, One Crazy Summer.

Brendan: Great movie.

Jeff: Cusack played the lovable tall leading man with the thick head of black hair and Piven played the tiny side character with what only looked like a thin layer of dryer lint from a brown sweater on top of his head. So sad….  Piven was only 20 years old in that movie and he already didn’t have a chance.

Brendan: With Entourage over, what’s the future hold for Jeremy Piven’s hair?

Jeff: The future for Piven's hair is one of constant work and turmoil.  He's reaching 50 years old and only time will tell how long he will keep the charade up. Like I said, I'm tired just thinking about all the work that has to go into that head every day, month and year.

Brendan: Thanks, Jeff!

Jeff: Wherever there is a celebrity, I will be there...to judge.  Wherever there is success of an actor/director/screenwriter or producer, I will be there...to find their flaws. Wherever there is Hollywoold celebrity with a minor cosmetic flaw, I will be there...to hate.

Brendan: Uh, thanks again, Jeff… Jeff, where are you going?

Jeff quickly exited and ran to the bathroom with two mirrors in hand to check the top of his head.

If your interested in further reading about the top of Jeremy Piven's head, the internet has plenty of information available including some particularly grisly looking hair transplant scars (that I chose not to include since, you know, I'm trying to keep things light). You've been warned.

See you next time… On the Bald Spot!

Using Powertools Without Losing Your Thumbs

Growing up in my house, if something broke and needed fixing, my dad, my mom, my sister and I all stared at each other for a long moment and cursed the gods for our misfortune. Eventually we’d all settle on the only solution that we could think of: let’s get a Phillips screwdriver.

No matter the problem, we’d invest all our hopes in the Phillips head screwdriver, the only tool we all knew by name. If that didn’t work, my dad, my sister and I would shrug our shoulders like “we did all that we could, but the patient was too far gone to save,” then assume that my mom would call the relevant professionals to fix the problem and forget all about the matter until it was magically fixed.

But back to the screwdriver, once the call went out to “Get the Phillips”,  my dad would race to his study to find an old vinyl LP  by "The Mamas & the Papas" from his collection, and my sister would run upstairs to her room to remove a “Wilson Phillips” cassette tape from her Walkman. While they were out of the way, my mom would instruct me to go down to the basement to get the Phillips screwdriver.

I would trudge downstairs to the basement and to the creepy unfinished storage alcove where an ancient dented blue metal toolbox rested in seclusion. According to family legend, my Grandpa Kainz had given his new son-in-law, my dad, the toolbox as a housing warming gift. My dad thanked him for the toolbox without asking him what it was or what it was for, and quickly forgot about it. That toolbox followed us from house to house and eventually from New York to Chicago where it found its final resting place in the basement storage place, covered in cobwebs.

I eventually (sorta) grew up, got married, and bought a house. And one day, my wife turned to me and said, "Wouldn't it be nice if we had a deck in the backyard?"

"Indeed," I said. "That would be nice."

"So why don't you build one?"

I looked deeply into her eyes and was surprised to find that she was deadly serious about this. I thought to myself, "Man, that's going to be hard to do with only a Phillips screwdriver."

Fortunately, my father-in-law not only has every tool known to man and possessed the knowledge to build anything worth building or fix anything worth fixing, he had four daughters and was dying to teach someone how to use them.

With his help, it took the entire summer, but I did build that deck in one one of the greatest manly triumphs of my life. I figured I had a lifetime pass from any future projects.

Then, a few weeks ago, my wife got another glean in her eye, actually a craving buried deep in the genetic code of a good majority of women. I'm talking of course about the craving for "organizational tools". In particular, my wife desired shelves in our basement to house all the baby crap we've accumulated in the last two years.

So I called on my father-in-law for more help.

Off to Menards we went to go wood shopping!

Wood. Seriously, they sell this stuff. You go to the store, pick it out and you go home with it. Really, this happens. Have I blown your mind yet?

All I'm thinking here is, "Don't saw off your thumbs, don't saw off your thumbs." It looks like my father-in-law is trying to keep me from running away.

We're smiling because we decided to take a long beer break. I'm also smiling because I think I look cool in my protective glasses. And I still have all my digits.

And here they are! Job well done.

I sipped my beer and looked over at my wife for approval and she said, "I was thinking, since these are already filled up, we should build some for the other wall."

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

Exclusive: Inside Jennifer Aniston’s Plot to Steal Kim Kardashian’s Unborn Baby

Our sources inside the editorial office of Us Weekly have confirmed that the magazine is in contact with the aging girl-next-door actress Jennifer Aniston to engineer the most sensational gossip story since the disappearance of the Lindbergh baby. The particulars of the plot would potentially combine all three elements of a successful Us Weekly story: Jennifer Aniston’s desire for a baby/redemption, Kim Kardashians rear end, and an actress selling out pictures of her newborn baby and subsequent candid pictures of the “mother and child” doing things like going on shopping sprees and eating gelato in designer baby couture.

Sources close to Aniston say that the plot came to her during one of her “Sad Sundays”, when the former Leprechaun actress lies on the couch all day eating Hydrox cookies like chips and watches Brad Pitt movies on loop while wrapped in a quilt knit by the children at the local orphanage who felt sorry for her and wanted to “do something nice”. According to sources in the area, on these “Sad Sundays”, a bat-signal that resembles the outline of her famous “Rachel” hairstyle is beamed out into the sky and locals promptly light candles, kneel on yoga mats, and pray for the alleviation of Jen’s sadness.

While flipping channels during a commercial break of “Ocean’s 12”, Aniston came upon the “Breaking News” that the daughter of the man who helped acquit OJ Simpson, Kim Kardashian, was officially married to a professional basketball player who held an under ten point career ppg average and plays for a laughingstock franchise (New Jersey Nets), Kris Humphries.

Aniston was offended that Kardashian was getting so much media attention while accomplishing so little.  That was her gig. She threw her Skinny Girl margarita at the TV in anger. On hearing the glass shattering, supposed boyfriend actor/”writer” Justin Theroux walked in and asked what was wrong. Jennifer looked at the unknown actor and said, “Who are you? No, really, who are you?” Theroux reportedly opened a leather bound copy of the latest issue of Us Weekly and showed her pictures of them together during their vacation the previous week. Aniston called the Us Weekly offices in NY for confirmation, and that’s when talks on the proposed heist began.

According to information obtained by former NewsCorp hackers recently hired by Brendan Mackey’s Blog, Jen has assembled the following team for the planned heist:

Courtney Cox- “Mother Hen”- in charge of planning and emotional support.

Matt LeBlanc- “Dr. Drake Ramoray”- scheduled to deliver the Kardashian spawn.

Former E News Anchor Steve Kmetco- “The Inside Man”- embedded inside the E camera crew covering the delivery.

Don Cheadle- “Don Cheadle”- Weapons.

Khloe Kardashian- “The Double Agent”- embedded inside the Kardashian family.

Justin Theroux- “The Beard”- reportedly Jen’s boyfriend, but Jen’s still skeptical.

Tate Donovan- “That Guy”- former Jen boyfriend, looking for work, paid per diem.

John Mayer- “The Crooner”- scheduled to sing the newborn baby to sleep.

Winona Ryder- “Heather”- snatch and grab.

Paris Hilton- “The Wheelman”- the getaway driver.

When unconfirmed rumors of the plot to kidnap her future not-yet conceived grandchild reached the Kardashian matriarch Kris Jenner-Kardashian-Jenner-Kardashian, she stated, “The protection and safety of the E camera crew is the most important thing to consider. I have instructed my scarecrow husband Bruce and whatever my sons are named to act as human shields to protect the E production team and their life-giving cameras.”

After the baby is procured, Aniston, a team of nannies, a masseuse, and a dialect coach will fly to Brad and Angelina’s château in France, which is scheduled to be empty at the time.  Once there, Aniston will break every framed picture of Brangelina in the house, then cut out Jolie from every picture and insert a picture of herself next to Brad. Then she will take a nap on Brad’s side of the bed just to smell his musk again. Then she will dress in Jolie’s sexiest black leather bondage gear and then call upon Satan himself for another round of negotiations.

According to sources close to Old Scratch, the Devil was contacted by Aniston’s representative at the CAA with a Faustian offer of the actresses’ soul.

Satan was reportedly confused by the offer, because Ms. Aniston along with her “Friends” co-stars, Ms. Cox, Mr. Perry, Mr. Schwimmer and cruelly, James Michael Tyler, the guy who played Gunther had ALREADY sold their collective souls to Satan in exchange for the enormous success of the aforementioned sitcom (for further reading on this matter, see court case Schwimmer v. Mephistopheles).

Satan informed Ms. Aniston that he could not except her soul offer since he was already in possession of her eternal soul, so like, what else did she have? That was when Jen (in accordance with the Us Weekly editorial board) came up with the idea of stealing the devil’s own baby (aka “Rosemary’s Baby” i.e. the Kardashian/Humphries celebu-infant) from the overprotective hands of her mother Kris and the E camera crew, and selling it back to him in exchange for something every actress craves: eternal youth.

The Lord of Darkness and the Office Space star agreed that in exchange for the child, he will grant her the gift of eternal youth with the caveat that while she will appear never to age, a single phototograph of her and Mr. Pitt of her choosing will age instead.

This photograph.

So for the time being, until Kim Kardashian gets pregnant and the nine months after, Jen will wait, whispering herself this prayer.

Come back to me, Brad.
Come back my sweet prince.
I will never age,
I will wait for you forever.
Come back to me.
Come back to me.
Come back.

The Curious Case of Jason Sudeikis

Jason Sudeikis is hot! He’s parlayed a few unremarkable years as a cast member on Saturday Night Live (a show that skims the cream of the crop from the sketch comedy and Improv world and forces them to grind out monotonous, unfunny sketches as some form of torture for both the audience and themselves), into a string of roles on TV shows like “30 Rock”, feature films like “Hall Pass” and “Horrible Bosses” and in the crowning achievement of junk culture, hosting the 2011 MTV Movie Awards.

But not only is Jason Sudeikis filling up the multiplex, he’s also a regular in the gossip rags like Page Six and Us Weekly. Each week it seems he is dating someone’s dream girl like January Jones (who has somehow managed to convince the world she’s even MORE unstable and frigid then her character Betty Draper on “Mad Men”), Eva Mendes (substance abuse), and Scarlett Johansson (Ryan Reynolds).

Who is this bright shining non-star?

How does this seemingly unfunny, average-looking guy get cast in all these movies AND date a string of stunning yet obviously wack-job actresses?

Is it just classic Hollywood talent agency pairing to get in the gossip rags to make him look like a hot leading man while the actress gets to appear stable? Is it a beard situation?

To get to the bottom of this mystery, I contacted my friend and celebrity gossip news hound Jeff Wolinski for his thoughts on the matter.

Take it away, Jeff!

“I don't care what people say but it is who you are connected to that gets you anywhere in show business/Hollywood.  Those "stars" can deny it all they want but they were connected to somebody to get where they are at now.  Be it a father, mother, brother, sister, uncle, cousin, godfather, college buddy or old babysitter...there is always a connection.

Jason Sudeikis --You described him perfectly-"seemingly unfunny, average-looking guy”.  His uncle is George Wendt.  He played Norm on Cheers, which made NBC, the home of SNL, a ton of money.  You are telling me that his uncle who played one of the most popular TV characters in the 20th century had nothing to do with him being on SNL?  Then you are full of shit.


 Also, you mentioned his dating life...well this goes to show you how pathetic this guy was before he "made" it.  He was married (Ed. Note- he was married to a 30 Rock writer Kay Cannon) but the second he got a tiny taste of the spotlight he gets divorced.  This reinforces the fact that he is a seemingly unfunny average looking guy who couldn't pull tail in his every day life.  He needed uncle George and SNL to give him the false confidence that he could get hot tail.  On top of that, he is pulling in wack- jobs with his celebrity status.  It shows he sucks and not cool at all in real life.”

Then Jeff kicked a wastebasket in his cubicle and yelled, “Come on!”

But, there you go. Mystery solved. Now you know, the secret ingredient to landing the world’s most beautiful and glamorous Hollywood actresses is one George Wendt.

Norm!

Moby Dude

One of the longstanding jokes in my family is that my dad liked the “idea” of a dog as a pet, but was unwilling to let us have a real dog. He liked the metaphorical dog, man’s best friend who’d fetch your slippers or sit at your feet idly napping while you read Proust in your easy chair. But acquiring an actual dog and all the barking and shedding and eating and pooping and smelling it entailed was always a non-starter.

In much the same way my dad liked the “idea” of being a dog owner, I have always liked the “idea” of fishing, and could fancy myself a fisherman under the right set of circumstances.

I love the epic man versus nature elements found in Melville, Hemmingway, and even the salty dog Bering Sea crab fisherman in the “The Deadliest Catch”. And equally attractive is the family-bonding element of “A River Runs Through It”. I even love fishing shows on TV with their professional master bassers decked out in enough advertising to make a NASCAR driver blush. Remember Jimmy Houston and his dark black sunglasses and that shock white mop of hair and his cool drawl?

Father’s and sons at war with nature and with each other, casting off their differences and dipping their lines in the water hoping to catch a “metaphorical” fish while becoming at one with nature and themselves. I can imagine putting on our waders and flinging our fly fishing lines in slow motion through the crisp Michigan air or manning a skiff in the Florida Keys on the hunt for the elusive bone fish or even just idly floating along in a rowboat on a Wisconsin lake.

The dude and I, waking up at dawn, at our secret fishin’ hole, grunting, casting lines, wearing those fun-looking bucket hats, baiting hooks, drinking bitter coffee (me) and Yoo-hoo (him) from tin thermoses, gutting our catch, and frying it up for lunch. I can imagine it all…

But in reality, I don’t like waking up early. I’m afraid of tipping over the boat and falling in and getting eaten by a shark or a largemouth bass (are their mouths large enough to fit a human head in?). Go to a sporting good store and there’s like four zillion types of rods and lures to choose from. It’s worse than golf equipment. This isn’t the low-pressure sport alternative to my score-obsessed golf game that I’m looking for. People take this seriously. And all those mosquitoes!

My earliest fishing memory is as a West Hills day camper using little pieces of mealy corn from a big chum bucket as lures and attaching them to a hook that resembled a bent paperclip. I distinctly remember catching a boot, but that could just be something that I imagined to be true.

I have been taken fishing a handful of times by neighbors and friends in the past and have enjoyed it. Once I caught two fish, but I secretly think I caught the same dumb-ass fish twice.  And after, I always think that it was fun and should do this again sometime, but that feeling wears off pretty quickly. I have the same reaction after going bowling. This is fun, why don’t I bowl more often? I asked myself.  I should wear bowling shirts and recruit a bunch of friends and join a league. Then a few years pass…

I don’t know if the Dude will get into fishing and want his fishing naïve dad to take him out on the water somewhere. What about the retention pond behind my house? But if he does, there’s always people like Papa Bill and Great Uncle Danny who are ready teach him how to properly bait a hook and cast a line without catching the back of your shirt.

Beady Eye Music, Mate

Going to the rock show! Time to put on my rock clothes. I look in my closet and ask my wife, “Where’s my skinny jeans? Where’s my belt chain? Where’s my poly cotton blend Spoon t-shirt? Where’s me fit trainers?”

I swear I had cool rock clothes, where’d they all go?  I find my skinny jeans (which used to be my fat jeans) and squeeze into them. My god these are tight. “Did you leave them in the dryer too long?” I accuse my wife. She looks at me sadly and goes back to concentrating on finding her own cool rock wardrobe.

Instead of cool rock clothes, I settle on my suburban-dad-attending-a-barbecue-after-hitting-a-bucket-of-balls-at-the driving-range-clothes. Only driving in the car to the venue do I realize that the shirt has some sort of baby-related stain on it (Vomitus? Mac & Cheese residue?).  Damn it, I’m dropping coolness points left and right! Was I ever cool? Maybe not if we’re using sabermetric (CPAR? Cool Points Above Replacement?) to judge my entire career, but I swear I had a few hot weeks back when I was around 23 or 24-years-old. But those days are apparently in the rearview mirror.

We have tickets to Beady Eye’s first show in the US and we’re meeting up with my friend and frequent collaborator Jeffrey (who is a drummer in a couple bands and still has rock clothes) and his wife. Beady Eye is the band that Oasis lead singer Liam Gallagher formed with the rest of Oasis after one final row with his brother guitarist and main songwriter Noel that finally broke up the band after twenty years.

Though I believe that it is in every long-running band's financial interest to at some point break-up, just to enable them to cash in on a reunion tour sometime in the future.

The brothers have been famously fighting for the entire history of the band, but apparently Liam attacked Noel backstage with both a plum and a guitar and Noel said he’d finally had enough and left the band.

You DO NOT attack the man that wrote “Wonderwall” and “Supersonic” with any pitted fruit. There are some things you just don’t do.

With Noel Gallagher packing up his songbook and going home, we’re left with Oasis without any of the songs that they’re famous for. No matter how much the crowd pleaded, there would be no “Wonderwall”, no “Don’t Look Back in Anger”, no “Champagne Supernova”, no “Cigarettes & Alcohol”, no “Shakermaker”, not even “Little by Little”. I’d even settle for “Hindu Times”.

What was on our prix fixe menu for the evening was a steady diet of the most dreaded words in rock concert history, the words that no concertgoer ever wants to hear. That’s right, I’m talking about the dreaded “new material”. Egads.

Now, to be fair, Beady Eye’s debut album, “Different Gear, Still Speeding” is surprisingly solid. It’s a fun little straight-ahead throwback rock n’ roll album. The band was tight and I thought that Liam’s voice sounded more engaged than it had in years. But it’s not even definitely maybe on par with “Definitely Maybe”.

Why the excitement over a band that really isn’t all that exciting? The reason is seeing Liam Gallagher in a small venue (the Metro, basically an oversized bar), the type of which he probably hasn’t played since the band hit it big. Liam Gallagher, one of the last great cock on the walk, petulant, bratty, obnoxious, bigger-than-life lead singers in rock n’ roll without his big brother, without those great songs to sing, with a fraction of the audience and armed only with new material and the other members of Oasis, of which only hardcore fans can name (Andy Bell & Gem Archer for the record). What would Liam do? Was there a chance this would be a debacle and we’d all end up on YouTube?

My father still talks about the disaster of a Kinks show he saw back in the day. Would this be my disaster story?

Alas, as much as it would have made a better story for the show to have ended in riots and/or pitted fruits hurled at the band while security beat the crowd back with pool cues, the show was pretty good and the band played well. Liam strutted out in a ridiculous Union Jack waistcoat that looked like it weighed a hundred pounds causing the hair dye in his trademark Beatles moptop/mullet to run down his neck (Okay, maybe that didn’t really happen, but in my mind it did).

In between verses during guitar solos, he did his trademark move of standing in front the stage to survey the crowd and folded his arms as if to say, “I conquered the world in 1995 and even if you don’t believe it anymore, the truth is I still own you. Worship me and receive nothing but my cool indifference in return.”

While Liam was doing his Liam thing of sneering, preening, and mumbling incomprehensible words to the audience in his thick Manchester accent, the bassist (who wasn’t an official member of the band and probably just a session guy) stood next to him looking absolutely coked out his mind, his eyes wide, ringing slot machine cherries, his hands independent from his brain haphazardly strumming his instrument. It looked like Liam gave the newbie a bump of rock star coke a minute before they went on stage. “Here, mate. Try this.” The good stuff, the stuff reserved for only the most decadent rock stars, the medical-grade-Merck- puffy-cloud-type coke that Keith Richards went on and on about in his autobiography and attributed his superhuman stamina to in the 70’s.

And while the musicians were on stage, what where the nostalgic aging Gen X-ers in the audience doing? Well, the music really didn’t necessitate any real dancing or deep shoegazing or moshing, so I kinda lightly tapped my hand on my thigh to the beat.

To my left, a guy lifted a girl on his shoulders. “Show us your tits!” a skinny fellow in a Pulp t-shirt shouted then looked away pretending that someone else had said it. The girl bowed to pressure and lifted her shirt and flashed her… bra. Those around her made it clear that they were of the opinion that she should perhaps show a tab more skin, and the poor girl who had no intention of showing any more quickly realized that she gotten in over her head and wanted out the situation and motioned for the guy to let her down. At that exact moment a meaty security guy wearing a black shirt appeared flashing a penlight telling them to break up this spontaneous display of rock clichés.  The girl yelled at the guy on whose shoulder’s she sat to let her down, but he was too busy texting on his cell phone.

Standing in front of me was a couple in their mid-to-late- fifties. The guy looked like he owned an independent record store specializing in vintage vinyl and the woman was probably an adjunct professor of Victorian literature at DePaul.

While Beady Eye played, the guy accompanied them by playing a mean air guitar, and the woman was so admiring of her man’s invisible ax-work that she was helpless when he dropped his “instrument” and dove in for a serious make-out session.  They were going for it. Their eyes were closed, their tongues were slipping and sliding, and their hands were everywhere.

And I was about three inches away from the whole thing.

Usually in floor seating-only shows, the crowd condenses itself into a tight pack and everyone tries to get just a little closer to the stage, so I was pretty pinned in my spot. All I could do was watch the action like I was Malcolm McDowell in “A Clockwork Orange”. Is that what kissing really looks like up close? Are they doing it right? Am I doing it right?

It was the final song of the night, the guitars swirled, the crowd cheered, the couple kissed like they were the only two people in the world as a movie camera tracked 360 degrees around them like at the end of a romantic comedy.

Then I realized that this show, this moment was not about my nostalgia for a time when I went to tons of shows and wore rock clothes, or the audience’s nostalgia for the mid-90’s when Britpop ruled the music world for a few minutes (Blur versus Oasis!) and people actually purchased music (Sam Goody! Tower Records!), or even for the band itself trying to reestablish themselves with a new name and new songs. It was about Jane Eyre and Air Guitar, nostalgic for each other.

And I couldn’t look away… even if I really wanted to.

The Dude Takes Flight

Close your eyes. You’re in an airplane. You’re 35,000 feet up in air.  You’re supposedly traveling at about 500 miles per hour, but you feel like you’re going nowhere.

You hear the nonsensical babbling of a small child. You try to ignore it. The babbling seamlessly blends into whining. You try to ignore it. The whining becomes crying. You can’t ignore it any longer. Does this child have parents? Can’t they please calm down this demon child? Isn’t that THEIR JOB?

The crying is now a full on tantrum. Other passengers must notice and share your disgust. Why is this child even on an airplane in the first place? Shouldn’t there be some form of rule against it? Can’t the parents even be shamed into forcing this child to be quiet for even a couple minutes?

The noise emanating from the child is getting closer. You feel it all around you. It won’t stop. Now you sense that the scornful looks of the rest of the plane are directed at you for some reason.

Open your eyes. The crying child is sitting next to you. It’s yours.

This is a live blog.

1:45- Boarding. Me, the Dude and Supermommy are flying to NY for a family vacation. We’re flying Southwest so they have an open seating plan. We board the plane to find our seats. As the Dude says, “Hi” to all the passengers already seated, they try to avoid eye contact as if to say, “Please don’t sit your snot-nosed kid next to me. Just keep walking.”

 1:46- We find our seats. Even though the Dude is technically young enough to sit on our laps for the two-hour flight, the Dude is pretty big for his age and awfully wiggly. So, we bite the bullet and buy him his own seat for everyone’s comfort.

1:47- We buckle the Dude in along with his traveling companions Dog-Dog (aka Blanket-Dog) and Bear who also needed to be buckled in with him. His binky (pacifier or nook as I’ve heard it called) is surgically attached to his lips. We don’t even care.

1:51- Our steward “Colin” casually says hello to us and asks how old the Dude is. We say, "a little under two, 22 months actually.” Colin the steward frowns and says, “He has to sit on your lap.” We say, “Wait a minute, we bought a ticket for him.” Colin the steward just shakes his head as if we are the worst people he as ever seen and walks away to do whatever they do when they’re not pretending to demonstrate how an oxygen mask works or seeing how many ice cubes they can fit in a tiny plastic cup of Sprite.

1:52- I realize that Colin the steward made me feel guilty for buying a ticket and giving the Dude his own seat, rather than putting him on the plane for free and let him crawl over some other poor passenger.  Point taken. Don’t give Southwest any extra money.

1:53- I take out Spirit, Southwest Airlines official magazine, from the seat pouch in front of me. I’m in luck because this month’s issue is “The Awesome Issue”. If you happen to fly next month you will receive the “Less Than Awesome Issue”. Sorry. The cover story is entitled, “Think This Looks Gnarly? Try Doing It At Night.” Awesome.

1:55- The poor suckers who didn’t get their tickets in time and we’re in the D line are now boarding the plane, frantically trying to find seats that aren’t near any little children.

1:59- The Dude’s diaper is already saturated with pee, and he has decided that seatbelts aren’t that fun after all. He tries to wiggle out of it like Harry Houdini in a sinking box bound by shackles and chains.

2:00- I open up Spirit Magazine: The Awesome Issue. I’m always fascinated by the letters to the editor section, I mean who reads this stuff on a flight and is stimulated enough to write in? I’ll tell you who, Dan Lothian CNN White House Correspondent in Washinton. He wrote in about a story Spirit did on golf, specifically the golf course TPC at Sawgrass and the island green on the 17th hole. He writes about how he doesn’t play golf but admires it, and perhaps when he has more time and he retires he might take it up. Thanks for the insight, Dan. Glad to hear your thoughts on the matter.

2:01- Take-off. We’re off! Quick tip- Binkies work great to combat ear popping caused by air pressure.

2:10- Our captain informs us that we can take out our electronic devices. Suppermommy whips out her trusty new iPad.

2:11- Our iPad in-flight movie today is Curious George 2: Follow That Monkey. The original film starred the voice talents of Will Ferrell, Drew Barrymore and Dick Van Dyke. The sequel uses the voices of Tim Curry, Matt Lauer, Clint Howard (Ron Howard’s brother) and Jerry Lewis. Downgrade?

2:15- The thing about Curious George is that he’s just so darn curious. It will get him into serious trouble one day, the type of trouble that even a man in a yellow hat can’t fix.

2:20- Turbulence!!!!! The Dude doesn’t seem to mind. Kinda fun.

2:25- The kid behind us is crying. It sounds like locusts buzzing. I feel a sense of smug superiority that my child is watching his iPad is rapt silence.

2:26- Dude loses interest in the movie and wants to stand up in his seat and dance. Looks like a situation. I pretend to be engrossed in my Spirit Magazine-The Awesome Issue and let Supermommy handle it.

2:27- Here’s a list of stats as reported by Spirit Magazine- The Awesome Issue: Hackers create 57,000 fake websites each week, modern punctuation wasn’t around until the 15th century, Dr. Seuss wrote Green Eggs and Ham using only 50 different words, and we consume nearly 50% more sodium than is recommended.

2:30- Snack time! The service staff distributes peanuts, pretzels and baked pita chips. Baked pita chips? Where the hummus? Hook a brotha up with a little chickpea, yo!

2:31- Supermommy is dismayed to find out that her bag of honey-roasted peanuts contains a grand total of one whole peanut and six halves. She essentially was handed a bag of honey-roasted air.

2:32- I triumphantly announce that my bag contains 22 honey-roasted peanuts.

2:33- Supermommy steals my bag of honey-roasted peanuts.

2:34- I place my drink order with the smug steward Colin. I order a Coke. Will I get a full can or not? Always a mystery.

2:40- Where’s that Coke, Colin? I’m thirsty!

2:42- I make a serious mistake by breaking down and eating my pita chips before my drink arrives.

2:45- The service staff, Colin included, are nowhere to be found. They must be retrieving my drink order by skydiving to the ground.

2:50- My Coke finally arrives. A splash of soda over 10 ice cubes.  I drink it in one swallow before the Dude gets wind of it. Now where’s that extra bag of pita chips I took from the Dude?

2:51- The Dude finishes eating the aforementioned bag of pita chips. The pita chips are gone. What will I do if the hummus spread arrives? SOL is what I’ll be.

2:53 The Dude attempts to flip the table tray with the iPad resting on it. Bye-bye, iPad!

2:55: I pretend trouble is not afoot and turn back to my Spirit Magazine-The Awesome Issue and read an article about all the fun you can have living in Baltimore. Avon Barksdale and Stringer Bell from “The Wire” would no doubt love for you to join their crew.

2:56-The seatbelt sign is off.

2:57-The seatbelt sign is back on. The Dude is not amused.

2:58- The Dude’s getting squirmy.

2:59 The Dude’s getting ticked off.

3:00 Ah, freak out.  Le freak, c’est chic!

3:05-3:30- Per a deal I made in conjunction with Southwest Airlines and the FAA, I cannot publicity comment on the events that occurred during this timeframe.

3:31- Juice.

3:32- I read a story in Spirit Magazine- The Awesome Issue about a canine genius who knows more than a thousand words.

3:50- Colin the steward implores us to turn off all electronic devices, blackberries, pinkberries, blueberries and Chuck Berrys. I didn’t make that up, that’s what he really said, people you got to believe me.

3:55- We begin our decent. Ahhhhh, we’re gonna die!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

3:56- No, we’re fine.

4:00- The plane lands. The stewardess (who looks like Thelma from the TV show “Amen”) gets on the intercom and sings to the tune of “Rockin’ Robin”.

Fly Southwest Airlines,
cheap, cheap.
Fly Southwest Airlines and we’ll really get you there,
cheap, cheap.

This really happened btw.

4:01- With time running out on my time with Spirt Magazine- The Awesome issue, I quickly flip to the end to read an interview with actor Bryan Cranston from "Breaking Bad". Heisenberg! New season of "Breaking Bad" starting soon. One of the best shows on TV and the best place to pick up tips on the fine art of meth cooking (way better than Rachael Ray's "Thirty Minute Meals" for instance- you can't rush good crystal- yummo!).

4:05- As we pack up our stuff to leave. The stewardess and a couple of passengers comment on what a good little boy the Dude was on the flight. Supermommy and I do a double take. I guess the standards of behavior on an airplane are graded on a curve.