January 9, 2014
Today’s music trivia was one of my favorite bands back in
the early 1990s until the lead singer/songwriter and the (awesome) drummer,
Dave Abbruzzese had a disagreement and the lead singer fired him in the latter
half of 1994. This is one of the best
drummers and one of the nicest guys out there. You can definitely tell the
difference between the first three albums and the ones that followed. Anyway, I really liked this band but really
quit following them ever since this incident.
Still a powerful band, I liked the fact hat they boycotted any venue
that Ticketmaster had control over due to their monopoly on ticket sales and
their greedy and ridiculous service charges and needless mark up of
prices.
I myself have avoided venues that Ticketmaster solely controls
ticket sales due to their high service charges.
Hey Ticketmaster, what are these service charges for anyway, you greedy
bastards? These past several years I
have only attended concerts at venues that sell their own tickets such as “The
Greek Theatre” does. We did lose another
great venue here in LA, “The Universal Amphitheatre” this past year when the
owners opted to build a Harry Potter amusement ride attraction instead, which
sucks. That was a great, small venue
that allowed you to be up close and personal with the artists. I saw so many artists and bands there over
the years such as The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Pat Benetar, Counting Crows, The
Black Crowes, Living Colour, and so many other bands, too numerous to
mention. So many good memories! We are going to miss that place!
I am looking forward to the Greek Theatre announcing their
event schedule soon so I can choose which concerts to be attending this
year. My good friend Bruce and I always
go together since he is on the preferred musician listing to get first crack at
tickets prior to going on sale to the public.
Unfortunately, you gotta pay for all the tickets when we order them at
the beginning of the year, which entails putting out a bunch of cash all at
once. That is not always an easy thing
to do, especially right after the holiday spending in December.
Good grief, Facebook has become an outlet for anyone who
needs some kind of personal recognition. People take non-stop photos of
themselves with their significant other to show everyone that their life is not
as lame as others may believe. Maybe they are marking their territory like a
dog or some kind of other animal does. They take photos of their food to show
everyone how creative they are or healthy they think they are eating. “Hey, look at me! See what I did? How cool am I?” Or their non-stop photos of
their kids or grandkids who are just so cute, to them at least. “Hey, look and
see how cute my offspring’s kid’s are!” Religious fanatics telling my to “Like”
their God, or share or pass along the word from Jesus or I’ll have bad luck for
a year.
Is it just me, or do these poor, pitiful people need some
sort of positive reinforcement and personal recognition from others that their
life is not as crappy as they think? I have begun forcing myself not to blast
these people on Facebook anymore. I
realized that some of these folks only have this outlet to the outside world,
beyond their life of mere existence. I am trying to be a kinder, gentler soul
this year, even though I really want to go off on some of these people on FB,
but I’ll keep trying to be tolerant as much as I can. I am not making any
promises, but I’ll try. I wonder how long this practice will last? Optimistically, I’ll give it a week! J
ATTENTION my
Peeps… Who is actually interested in accompanying us on our road trip in
2015? If yes, during what leg of our
journey would you be interested in traveling with us in Linus, our 1978 VW
Camper Bus, complete with bunks? You will need to remember that we will have to
pick you up at one location and we will drop you off at another location so you
can travel back to your home. This will need to be highly coordinated effort,
but I anticipate only a couple of you guys to really come through and travel
with us. I know it can be a daunting
effort just to work out the logistics of it all, just think how I feel about
trying to do this all. We will try to work with you to make this happen. We
still have a year to work out any details. First come, first served to reserve a sector
on this adventure. We will be staying in motels every once in a while just to
feel human again, if needed. Mostly we
will be camping either in a campground with the usual amenities or out in the
middle of nowhere off the grid in a boondocking setting.
1. Our first sector begins in the LA area and we go north along
the Pacific Coast and the Sierra Nevada Mountains visiting some of the best
National Parks the US has to offer, such as Kings Canyon, Sequoia and of course
Yosemite.
2. Our second sector continues north all the way to the
Seattle area to visit a friend.
3. Then our next sector is when we travel East along the top
of the US through Montana and Wyoming to visit Yellowstone National Park.
4. Then maybe we will go down into Colorado to see some
friends.
5. Then we continue East into South Dakota and continuing on
through Minnesota, Wisconsin and even maybe through the Upper Peninsula of
Michigan before heading back south to Chicago.
6. After a short break of maybe a week or so in Chicagoland,
we will head East again to Ohio to visit one of my best friends ever in
Cincinnati.
7. We then will continue to drive along the Great Lakes with
our Northeast destination to be in the state of Maine.
8. After a stint visiting a friend in Boston and the New
England area, we will head south through all the eastern mountain ranges.
9. We will then continue along the east coast all the way
down into the Florida Keys and finally ending up in Key West.
10. The next sector will be heading back towards Chicagoland
to rest up before our next sector.
11. After a rest in Chicagoland, we will retrace the
Original Route 66, using all the old roads as possible all the way back to
Santa Monica, California.
During all these road trips, we will have our laptop
computer with internet access, as well as a smartphone and a GPS receiver unit
to keep in touch will all of you readers.
This is why we started this blog, just to keep in touch with all of you
while we are traveling. I just started
doing this early so I would be in the daily habit of doing it as well as to get
any feedback for places to visit and any valuable input from you guys. We are
still open for any suggestions on possible sites to visit and any interesting
destinations, so please, just let us know.
So, let’s hear from you folks interested in joining us on a
leg of our US back roads trip. We look
forward to hearing something from you all…
As Snoopy always says, Bark Less and Wag More!
Until next time… Be Good!
- cb
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