It occurred to me this morning as I was going through my new daily ritual of having two wet noses thrust into my armpits at 6 am that the decision to have a second dog is much easier than the decision to get a dog. The first dog required lots of planning, thoughts about lifestyle changes, the needs of the pet, buying books and soliciting advice on how to be a good owner, etc.
With the second dog, the thought process was basically “If Tunch is going to be safe, I guess I need another leash.”
BTW- 21 years ago this month, I was lucky enough to see this guy play live at the Mid-Hudson Civic Arena in Poughkeepsie, NY:
Still a genius. And his music has not aged at all.
*** Update ***
BTW, I’m not sure what kind of growing season you all are having, but I feel like I am living in a tropical rain forest this year. I have to cut the grass every five days, and instead of the usual once a week to ten days pruning of the tomatoes, I am finding myself having to aggressively prune and re-tie every 2-3 days. And I don’t mean pulling a few little suckers off here and there. I mean having to cut off large limbs that were not there a few days ago. On some plants 30-40% of the bulk every couple of days needs to go. Crazy. Must be the rainy mornings, humid days, and hot nights, but jeebus.
flukebucket
Kinda like having kids.
schrodinger's cat
All you need is another cat, to restore balance between the puppies and the kittehs. How is the mighty Tunch this morning?
Comrade Javamanphil
This thinking is how I ended up with four cats.
Bruuuuce
Saw SRV once; he was brilliant. But because he was opening for Peter Gabriel, it was a serious case of dissonance in styles, and not something I was looking for at the time.
stuckinred
@Bruuuuce: I remember a “younger” friend who went to see SRV and really liked him but he said “he only played one song and it lasted three hours!”
debit
@schrodinger’s cat: Tunch may not want another cat in his domain, but John will never know until he tries. Our eldest cat, Max, is intensely interested in being friends with everyone and everything (including Chloe, much to her dismay and confusion). The other two cats hang out almost exclusively with each other and are good buddies, but it took a couple months for the testing and circling to stop.
BGK
@Comrade Javamanphil:
Or five. Not that I mind waking up at the bottom of a cat pile. As the nurse at my vet’s office says, “the sucker light is on at your house.”
genius
“Genius”
Gee, where does that leave Mozart?
He’s an 11, right?
Bruuuuce
@stuckinred: Considering that I was there to see a prog-rock show by a man whose masterpieces include both a 25-minute song (“Supper’s Ready”) and a double-disc concept album (“The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway”), that’s the last complaint I’d have. It was that hot blues and prog rock aren’t the sort of things I’d program together, despite loving both.
arguingwithsignposts
Blues does not age.
Poopyman
@BGK: Yeah, I got that comment too. I requested my own parking space at the vet’s, or maybe our own exam room, but so far they’ve said no. Right now we’re holding at 5 cats, although there are a couple of feral ones at work who’ve been giving me the come-hither look.
Is it really that obvious?
You think the decision for #2 was easy, wait until #3.
geg6
Heh. This is how my John ended up with an arthritic, stubborn, and fat yellow Lab, a hyperactive golden retriever who craves the human touch every single minute of the day, and a macho and assertive chihuahua called, incongruously, Lulu. Thankfully, his last rescue, the sweetheart of them all, Cane the boxer was happily adopted and we hold steady at 3.
Should Henry (the Lab) ever go to the big doghouse in the sky (he’s 12, so…), I will not expect the dog population to remain at two. John will find some poor damaged soul of a dog and it will be the lord of the domain just as the current three are.
Oh, and SRV is/was a god. That is all.
stuckinred
@Bruuuuce: I’m with you. Shit, Hendrix opened for the Monkees!
“As Mike Nesmith observed: “The night he opened in front of us … he walked into the beast. There were twenty thousand pink waving arms. He would sing “Foxy” and they would shout, “Davy” – “Foxy” – “Davy … ” Oh, man, it was a seriously twisted moment. He lasted seven dates.”
To make a bad situation even worse, Hendrix joined the tour in progress in Jacksonville, Florida on 8 July 1967, just before the Monkees were scheduled to play a couple of shows in North Carolina. One would have been hard pressed to have found a part of America less likely to appreciate what Micky Dolenz described as “this Black guy in a psychedelic Day-Glo blouse, playing music from hell, holding his guitar like he was fucking it, then lighting it on fire” and what Eric Lefcowitz termed “the cacophonic strains of Hendrix’s feedback orgies mixed with his lascivious sexuality.”
BigHank53
I met a hiker in North Carolina who had just picked up two abandoned hound puppies, and was agonizing over which to send to the shelter. I told him that taking care of two dogs wasn’t twice as much work–it was more like 15% more work than taking care of a single dog.
I hope he kept them both. The poor little guys needed each other.
Face
I used to work with a woman that had 19 cats. True to the stereotype, she was literally crazy and had to quit the company.
JAHILL10
Hey JC
Thanks for this. I hadn’t heard any SRV for a long time. Still great. Probably the best thing to ever come out of Texas.
Bruuuuce
@stuckinred: *nods* I knew about that. A little too young to have been there (I’m only getting my AARP card next year), but it’s a classic story.
I wonder sometimes about how artists select their opening acts. I’ve seen some good ones, and some stinkers, and several, like SRV/PG, where both are good, but just don’t go together.
Relatedly, I saw Steve Hackett and Renaissance here in NYC last night. Hackett still has it; he was smoking hot. Renaissance, unfortunately, was not: one keyboardist was too loud, the other just not good enough for the music they play (it has some really intricate piano bits, where he couldn’t handle it). Worse, Annie Haslam’s voice seemed to give out after the second song (“Carpet of the Sun”); she was both straining to hit notes and consistently flat afterward.
Bruuuuce
@stuckinred: *nods* I knew about that. A little too young to have been there (I’m only getting my AARP card next year), but it’s a classic story.
I wonder sometimes about how artists select their opening acts. I’ve seen some good ones, and some stinkers, and several, like SRV/PG, where both are good, but just don’t go together.
Relatedly, I saw Steve Hackett and Renaissance here in NYC last night. Hackett still has it; he was smoking hot. Renaissance, unfortunately, was not: one keyboardist was too loud, the other just not good enough for the music they play (it has some really intricate piano bits, where he couldn’t handle it). Worse, Annie Haslam’s voice seemed to give out after the second song (“Carpet of the Sun”); she was both straining to hit notes and consistently flat afterward.
Pigs & Spiders
I will be getting my first dog in a few months, a black & tan Shiba Inu, and I have to agree that the first dog feels like a bigger decision than any other I have made thus far in life. It’s actually stressing me out.
stuckinred
@Bruuuuce: I’ve got Santana tix next month and Windwood is opening. I haven’t seen Carlos in 41 years, the day after I landed back stateside!
NobodySpecial
I had a ticket for that last show and had to work. It would have been my first time seeing him, too.
stuckinred
@Pigs & Spiders: Beautiful dogs, don’t be stressed, your life will be enriched beyond belief.
garage mahal
Stevie in peak form here on Austin City Limits after he cleaned up. His leads are like laser focused lightning bolts seemingly endless pulled up whenever he wants. The first thing I thought when I heard he died was why couldn’t this have been Bon Jovi instead. Is that bad?
eemom
@Face:
Jeez. I have a very sad story about an old friend who fell prey to the “collector” syndrome. Long story short, a really good person with the best intentions in the world, she ended up with FORTY cats — in an efficiency apartment in NYC.
My husband and I were going to adopt one from her, and somehow it all went awry and she didn’t want to give it to us and my daughter, who was then only 8, got upset and so I got into an argument with her and I’ve never heard from her again. Often wonder what happened to her.
Rosalita
@Comrade Javamanphil:
you and me both. that and the fact that I had a friend who was a cat breeder…I was doomed
Pigs & Spiders
@stuckinred: Thanks! I have been waiting for this dog since 2006. Everything finally aligned for me to get him. Now all I have to do is learn to be the Alpha male…
Bruuuuce
@stuckinred: Sounds like fun; enjoy it!
(I am slightly amused because these days, I’m rooting for a different Carlos Santana, whom I have on my fantasy baseball team.)
stuckinred
@Pigs & Spiders: Jesus, be careful or you’ll ignite another love/hate Ceasar thread. I do suggest the Monks of New Skete regimen but I’m sure someone will have something negative to say about them.
Chat Noir
@Pigs & Spiders: I felt the same way before my two oldest cats arrived almost 11 years ago. Adopting them was the best decision I ever made (well, it’s tied with marrying my husband and then adopting out youngest kitty two years ago).
Good luck! Look forward to many puppy stories and pictures.
Pigs & Spiders
@stuckinred: LOL, didn’t mean to start that up, I’m actually only vaguely aware of his existence. The Shibas are pack dogs though, so from what I’ve read they do a lot better when they have an “Alpha” figure.
stuckinred
@Pigs & Spiders: I think all dogs do but what do I know, I’ve only had doggies for 40 years.
Mary
@stuckinred: Ha! Don’t get me started on the Monks. (But seriously, while not nearly as bad as Cesar, their methods are rather outdated.) If you need a celebrity dog-trainer to learn from, go watch “It’s Me or the Dog” with Victoria Stilwell. Except don’t listen to her nonsense about crates being cruel and unusual. And also, the British version is 100 times better than the American (isn’t that always the case with TV?)
geg6
John, I feel your growing season pain. Harvest is bountiful, but awfully early. John and I plan to make some raspberry jam this weekend because we have this bumper crop of them and can’t eat them fast enough. He already has made several black raspberry pies, we’ve eaten enough red raspberries and cream/ice cream to turn red ourselves, and the pears are looking almost ready to drop.
We just planted the beans and peas a couple of weeks ago and they have already climbed almost to the top of the fence. The green onions have taken over an entire section of the veggie garden and the tomatoes and peppers and various squashes have the look they usually get in early August.
We are chalking it up to the exceptionally snowy winter refreshing the ground water supplies, the very warm spring, the extremely hot and humid early summer, and the astonishing number of sunny days (for Western PA, that is) we’ve had through it all.
serge
The best thing about dogs is that, in plurality, they tend to train themselves. I’ve never had fewer than two dogs, maximum four (one a Great Dane). Never dip below two…the older dogs will show a new dog, or a pup, the way things work in your household as to feeding schedules, the “ok, now we’re all going outside to pee, and or, shit” moments. I loves dogs.
stuckinred
@Mary: I read there book and especially liked the crate training for the Bohdi when he was a pup. Outdated? Dog training is like education, the same stuff gets recycled over and over. My dogs live WITH us, they are always around people, kids and other dogs and we love them and guide them.
Kennedy
It does seem to defy logic, but having two dogs is almost always easier than one. Unless they’re large dogs, I suppose. I was super anxious when my wife wanted to add a Lhasa Apso (the favorite breed of her childhood) to our already spastic, ball-of-energy 6 month old Boston Terrier, but it ended up being an excellent decision. Not much more work, and the dogs entertain each other for the most part. It was getting hard having a Boston Terrier bring me a ball every day after I got home from work for hours and staring at me with her eyes and saying OMGPLEASETHROWTHEBALLOVERANDOVER.
Also, don’t look now but I figured I should give everyone a heads up that MTP has an EXCLUSIVE!!! with John McCain on Sunday to discuss the McChrystal resignation. I am sure he will say that Obama acted honorably and made the correct decision, McCain’s mancrush for Petraeus notwithstanding.
stuckinred
I keep trying to post a picture of my 1969 Santana ticket and it just disappears?
http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1254/4730380404_b7879e1801_o.jpg
I’m sorry, that’s the poster. The ticket is on Wolfgangs Vault and the price for the show was $3.50. The one at Chastain Park is $100!
Captain Goto
Oh, man. Re: Stevie–
Saw him in ’87 at Heinz Hall, Albert King was the opening act. At the end of the show, Stevie commented on how good it was to see Albert (called him “his Daddy”).
I was in the balcony, so with his wide brim on, I barely saw Stevie’s eyes for the entire show. He had on a gray three-piece with a string tie, to go with his cowboy boots.
By the time he got to the 5th number, that gray suit was getting serious pits, and when he got to the end—with a blow-the-roof-off take on “Couldn’t Stand The Weather” that gives me chills to remember it now—that motherfucker was *drenched*.
Genius in our midst. And then (I guess not long after John saw him) he was gone.
Motherfucking God damn it to hell.
arguingwithsignposts
@Kennedy:
head/desk
Kristine
Ok, my turn to ask a dumb question–why prune the tomatoes? Is it just to get rid of non-blossoming stalks and send the strength to the places with the blossoms? I’ve always just put a cage around mine and let them go, and I had almost more tomatoes than I could handle last summer. Lots of freezer sauce.
I agree about the crazy growing. Yes to the lawn. Yes to the other growing things. It’s the heat and humidity, which is making up for last year’s cool and cloudy. My cilantro still went to seed, though, and aphids attacked the pepper and tomato leaves for the first time that I recall.
QuaintIrene
John, theres no need to prune the ‘suckers’ from your tomato plants. It’s pretty much accepted now that that’s unnecessary. They’re not detrimental to your plant. The more foliage , the more food/energy it produces for your tomato plant. And the more branches, the more tomatoes.
So unless you’re trying to grow a prize-winning gigantor or you’re looking for extra exercise, don’t prune.
geg6
@Captain Goto:
I was at that show! It was awesome.
At another place and time on the interwebs, my tag line was “I’m a slut for the blues.”
It all started for me back in the 70s at Mancini’s Lounge in McKees Rocks. They used to have great blues and rock bands there and I saw a BB King show there and it was all over for me. Blues and punk, for me, are the only music that really matters.
PopeRatzy
I really have never grasped the adoration for SRV. He is good, he plays the guitar well and his singing, at best, is adequate (see Clapton, Eric). If I want to hear someone play modern electric blues guitar there are a plethora of musicians out there that are far superior to SRV. Just off the top of my head Hubert Sumlin, Lurrie Bell, Byther Smith, Eddie Kirkland & Carl Weathersby come to mind. There is something about the Jimi Hendrix school of inflammatory guitar playing that has always struck me as more style over substance. The ability to pay fast & loud does not make one a great guitar player. Give me just about any of the Kings (Albert, B.B., Jimmy, Freddie) over that style of play any day.
Besides, the whole Jimi school is just a ripoff of T-Bone Walker.
stuckinred
@PopeRatzy: People like the music THEY hear not what some self-appointed expert tells them is “superior”. It’s about time, place and heart. If you think Hendrix was just about playing his axe then you were not there.
John Cole
But if I don’t prune the garden looks so disorderly and overgrown. Plus, it makes it easier to keep weeds out and to tie them so they grow in the direction I want.
cleek
i saw SRV at the NY State Fair, circa 1986. he killed it.
no real rain here in weeks, and we’re going on our 15th day of 90+ temps. nearly all my grass is brown, despite daily watering.
SlothropRedux
John,
I second (and third) the post by QuaintIrene above. Don’t prune. You will see studies on both sides of this, with some people thinking pruned plants have marginally higher productivity, and others measuring higher yields for unpruned plants. Most controlled studies of this are for commercial, hybrid varieties where they are concerned about uniformity of size and ripeness at harvest. For YOUR purposes, pruning shouldn’t really be an issue. Just let ’em go and keep tying as you see fit. You should see a slightly higher yield for any heirloom tomatoes you’re growing. Plus the greater amount of foliage helps to shade the soil, keeping in moisture and suppressing weed growth (which shouldn’t be a problem because you have mulched everything so well… right?)
BR
Hmm. I think that was obvious:
lawguy
Same here, alathough I’m using the weather to re-read Graham Greene’s “A Burnt OUt Case” set in a leapore colony in the rain forest of Africa. Feel the atmosphere.
Phoenix Woman
@garage mahal:
Come sit here by me, buddy. As somebody writing for an audio mag said a long time ago, by rights Bon Jovi should be working at a Roy Rogers on the New Jersey Turnpike.
Stevie was just getting his life together and then it was gone. Un-flipping-fair.
Meanwhile, in other news: All the folks worrying that Petraeus is now a shoo-in for 2012 (or any time thereafter) can relax. Ain’t gonna happen.
kgrant1073
I was just perusing my Facebook page (I know, I know) when confronted with a truly horrifying post from a loose acquaintance of mine – he was trumpeting a Palin-Petreaus (sp?) bid for 2012. What was most stunning was the sheer foolish knavery in the description of Palin as the former governor/executive of an oil-producing state. How is it that seemingly intelligent people can actually believe that Palin is, well, worth anything? Yeesh.
stuckinred
@kgrant1073: poon tang
Graeme
It’s our first time trying a garden in SF. Everything is dying because it’s cold and wet.
Anyway, it’s humbling. Some of the herbs are doing well, and the tomatoes that survived seem to be doing OK so far. They probably need more heat.
I bought a grow light for starting stuff indoors. I think we have to get them to a point where they are pretty hearty to survive the swirling cold winds of our back yard. Someone I work with mentioned she used to build cheap makeshift greenhouses with plastic sheeting & PVC pipe. I may have to do that.
It’s our first year, so we expect some failures. We’ll figure it out. In the meantime, we ARE in SF. Thus, we can go to a great farmer’s market almost every day of the week.
Just Some Fuckhead
Yeah, same here. I’m already on the mower’s highest setting with my St. Augustine lawn.
mr. whipple
Too much rain has led to too much mold and bugs. The only thing thriving here is lettuce.
stuckinred
@Phoenix Woman: My goodness, I didn’t know you came over here!
raven
arguingwithsignposts
@PopeRatzy:
Look, I can take your anti-SRV rant, but B.B. has been playing the same riff for over 50 years.
Also, too, SRV wasn’t just a Jimi rip-off. There’s a huge streak of Texas r&b that SRV mined that wasn’t in the Jimi lexicon.
ETA: Stevie and brother Jimmy on a double-neck.
Svensker
@PopeRatzy:
I say there’s room for everybody. There’s something about SRV’s voice that really hits me even tho technically he’s not a great singer. You can argue merits — someone has a better technique, someone else has amazing range, etc., etc. But at a certain level, it comes down to personal taste and whether the performer has “It” for the listener. For me, SRV had “It.” Eric Clapton has always left me completely cold except for the Cream years (and that had more to do with Jack and Ginger for me) — I know he’s supposed to be great but I find him duller than dull. Obviously a lot of people disagree with me.
Comrade Mary
@John Cole:
John, sweetie, life is messy. So are tomato plants. You can indulge your love of order and control by embarking on a gentle, caring program of bondage with your tomatoes, but you don’t have to prune them.
I have a raspberry plant (pictures later) that grew from a single stick last summer that produced maybe 10 berries, to a triffid that is taking over the entire plot with at least 5 more spawned plants. Those are being moved to the corner of the yard where I stand a chance against them, and the parent plant is being tied up against sticks with tomato tape so I can walk by it without blood being shed.
elmo
@Graeme:
Wha?
::blinking::
::faints::
(we’ve had 95+ and humid here for three weeks, lows in the mid-70s, and I officially hate you now)
stuckinred
@arguingwithsignposts: The best blues show I ever saw was the JVC Blues festival in Atlanta. BB was the headliner and Johnny Winter played before and with him. BB played way more and sang way less and I really think JW pushed or inspired BB to kill it.
Phoenix Woman
@stuckinred: Nah, the Grifta from Wasilla won’t be hooking up with Petraeus — he’s going to be tied up in Afghanistan for the next, oh, two to five years or so (duration depends on a) how long it takes him to come up with a plan to make a kinda-sorta face-saving exit and b) how long he tries to implement it before giving up and doing a full-on unashamed retreat).
Nope, if the Grifta goes with anyone, I’m betting it’s Rudy: They’re remarkably similar in that they get otherwise-smart people to think they’re politically viable, and rake in the cash as a result. (I think Palin’s something like $15 million richer than she was three years ago.) They both know they can’t win, so they’ll fleece the rubes one last time before even industrial-strength Botox can’t undo the ravages of time and tanning beds for Sarah.
cleek
@Svensker:
Clapton post-Cream doesn’t do much for me, either. a few good/great songs, but a whole lot of … meh. but his Cream years and his stuff with John Mayall is awesome.
but SRV is in a whole other league; a better player than Hendrix, even (though Jimi’s imagination and innovation was light years beyond SRV’s).
stuckinred
@Svensker: Dylan isn’t much of a singer either. . .technically?
stuckinred
@cleek: Um, have ANY of you ever heard of Layla?
PopeRatzy
@stuckinred I was there for T-Bone Walker, long before there was a Jimi Hendrix. Here is your hint, David Kearney.
arguingwithsignposts
@stuckinred:
Actually interviewed B.B. prior to a show in Texas, and saw the show. I don’t discount that he’s an awesome player, and was still touring at least 200 days a year back in the late ’80s when I did the phoner. Both the Winter bros. are awesome, too.
He was very gracious to a young reporter as well.
stuckinred
@arguingwithsignposts: Cool did he bring Lucille?
Phoenix Woman
@Comrade Mary: That (or its babies) sounds like a good candidate for putting into an upside-down strawberry pot. The main drawbacks would be anchoring the sucker so it didn’t blow over and making sure you watered it every day, as plants in upside-down containers do need a lot more water than conventionally-grown buggers.
Oh, and raspberry jam. Yum!
Phoenix Woman
@stuckinred: Oh, yeah. Just haven’t been too much lately, as I’ve been preoccupied. How are you?
arguingwithsignposts
@stuckinred:
Of course. Although I think he was on the third or fourth version of Lucille by that point. And I should also mention that he did an awesome show, interacting with the audience, staying longer than he was supposed to, etc. And it was a small hall, no more than 500 people. It always boggles my mind that legends like that are playing small auditoriums while some of the shite bands that come out these days are playing 20,000-seat arenas.
cleek
@stuckinred:
i did say “a few good/great songs”.
and, Duane Allman was a big part of “Layla”. without Allman’s soaring slide guitar, “Layla” wouldn’t be half the song it is. nor would the album.
stuckinred
@PopeRatzy: Aite dawg, you are an aficionado dealing with the unwashed masses. I like Peter Green and can’t stand Fleetwood since they became a girl group, Bet no one cares about that either.
stuckinred
@cleek: Who you tellin?@
Phoenix Woman: Doin fine, blood pressure is must better post FDL!
cleek
@stuckinred:
you ?
arguingwithsignposts
@geg6:
I have to give a shout-out to the bluegrass here, because there are some awesome players in their midst. David Rawlings is teh bomb. Peter Rowan. Tony Rice. David Bromberg. I could go on.
Randy P
Geographically speaking, you in WV (not far from Pittsburg as I recall) are no distance at all from me in the western Philly suburbs. But we don’t seem to be having the same climate.
Maybe it’s rain. It’s been a hot summer so far, but fairly typical in terms of not getting much rain. I’ve read that’s a description of the Mediterranean climate, so maybe I should start investigating Mediterranean species.
andy
Tomatoes love it when it’s warm. We had this week where it rained every day and they just sort of hung out- now that we have a few days of warmth it’s like they’re exploding out of the ground. And pruning is super important. Not only does it concentrate all that growth, but clearing out the understory gives the slugs fewer avenues to get up into your ripening tomatoes!
tesslibrarian
I’m trimming my tomatoes like crazy, too. I swear one vine grew at least a foot overnight this weekend. It’s like a kudzu-tomato hybrid.
At 6:30 this morning, it was already 78 degrees. (It’s now a muggy 87.) I’ll be lucky if the tomato vines don’t start trying to seek refuge indoors by the time I get home from work.
PopeRatzy
@Svensker You will never get an argument from me about Clapton. I have no idea who told him he could sing but that person should be forced to listen to the unplugged version of Layla for 48 hours straight. Some of his lesser known instrumental guitar work is as solid as anyone’s.That said, I felt his playing Robert Johnson was at best pedestrian.
@arguingwithsignposts B.B. has mined a very specific sound for a very very long time. That does not diminish the simplicity of what he does. Play the riff, sing the line. His singing/playing is quite unique and when combined with his songs (especially with Taub) you get a musical style that fairly defies comparison. He is probably the greatest at using the guitar as his “other” singing voice.
As for other people that have somewhat less than classic voices, Petty, Dylan or even Hank Williams, it was the song, baby, the song. At a certain point the musicians and the singer become less important than the message. Marshall McCluhan got pretty damn close.
Maude
@arguingwithsignposts:
We have a local radio station that plays a lot of bluegrass and old country. They even sponser live music on a weekly basis.
ThresherK
A friend of mine had her cat for 18 years, and after it died, grieved properly. She then replaced him with two littermates, and added a third, a stray, later.
She says she wants to do more dating. Is replacing one cat with three helping her get her any closer to this outcome?
PS Bon Jovi has found another kind of stage to darken: He had a taped appearance on the Tony Awards congratulating a band member for nominations.
Randy P
@ThresherK: We’ve had the discussion of what the threshold is from “cat owner” to “crazy cat person”. Since at one point we had three cats, we decided the number is higher than three. We settled on four.
So your friend is OK, unless the cats meow incessantly and the house smells like a litterbox.
Laura Clawson
I don’t know about growing, but yesterday as I was leaving my office building I ran into an acquaintance who told me to prepare myself because “it’s like walking into somebody’s mouth.”
Svensker
@stuckinred:
True, and while I like his stuff pre 80s, after that his voice his so horrendous I can’t stand to listen. Doesn’t mean the song is bad, tho.
But then, I can’t stand most Bruce Springsteen cuz his voice is like fingernails on chalkboard, to me.
You can argue technique and talent. Can’t argue taste.
ThresherK
@Randy P:
No danger of crazy cat lady on her part. The cats are happy and the place is well-kept. And (as mentioned above) three cats aren’t 3x the work one is.
it was the song, baby, the song
“Delivering a song” and “singing nicely/technically/attractively” need not be related, as demonstrated by folks like Willie Nelson to Rex Harrison.
mb
If you are trying to grow attractive tomato plants, you’d be better off buying tomatoes from the farmers market and growing something that has a nicer form. If, on the other hand, you want to grow tomatoes, stop pruning. Now. Tomato plants do not have a beautiful form — they do, however, produce really good tomatoes. The bigger the plant is the more tomatoes you’ll get. You’ve already probably cut your overall yield by 50% or more by the aggressive pruning you’re doing. If you’ve ever loved a tomato, now is the time to stop pruning!! Also, for the Troops.
geg6
@arguingwithsignposts:
And that just goes to show that it takes all kinds.
I’d rather die than be forced to listen to anything that has any relation to country or swing or bluegrass. In fact, such things probably will make me die because I’ll just kill myself rather than suffer through it. I’d rather listen to disco. Really.
slag
Beyond which, with the first dog, you had to make repeated trips to the puppy prison. All the time wondering which, if any, dog was going to be the right dog for you. With the second, you just had to open your car door.
arguingwithsignposts
@geg6:
Yes, I guess it does take all kinds, because I love the punk and the blues, but also the bluegrass and the old skool country. I’d encourage you to take a chance and go to a Merlefest or similar bluegrass festival. There are a lot of DFH’s there just like at Bonnaroo or similar.
p.a.
If possible SRV would time his Providence shows to coincide with Roomful of Blues playing at a local club (Lupo’s Heartbreak Hotel). The Roomful horn section would back SRV for some songs in the 2,500 seat Prov.Performing Arts Ctr., then we would head over to Lupo’s where Vaughn would sit in with Roomful in a 500-head venue. (Although for Rich Lupo firelaw capacities were more of a general guideline than a hard-and-fast rule ; ) ) Great great stuff.
geg6
@arguingwithsignposts:
I worked in country and bluegrass bars for about 10 years and have many friends who are very active musicians in both. I also worked for a country music radio station for about 5 years. I’ve given them more chances than I have ever given a genre of music. And, honestly, I still hate them. Not just don’t like, but actively hate.
I am not necessarily proud of this. It is just the way it is for me. I can listen to many kinds of music. I can’t listen to anything related to country. Just can’t. And only punk and the blues make my heart sing. I don’t know why this is, but, at my advanced age, I have quit fighting it.
c u n d gulag
John,
If you ever go to the Poughkeepsie Civic Center for a show again, let me know. I live in the area, about 6 miles away.
E-mail me, and I’ll meet you and buy you a beer on my windfall unemployment money (joke!) at a fine local watering hole.
fucen tarmal
house of blues
so sayeth george carlin
Gus
@PopeRatzy: I really don’t see SRV or Jimi as being the same genre as classic blues as played by someone like Hubert Sumlin. It’s blues-based, but not really the blues. I was fortunate enough to see SRV twice. First time at an outdoor show, I was so high and the music was so intense I had to go lay down on a grassy hill. Second time he opened for Jeff Beck, and they played a couple numbers together. Awesome stuff.
Gus
@stuckinred: I’ve seen Johnny Winter twice. He’s notorious for showing up late, playing short shows, etc. The first time I saw him he played maybe 50 minutes, but he tore it up. I complained to a friend about the length of the show, and he said “yeah, but he played two hours worth of notes.” The second time I saw him he was terrible. If I was in a dead pool he would have gone into it right after that show, ’cause he looked like a corpse. Moreso than usual even.
arguingwithsignposts
@geg6:
fair enough. different strokes and all.
Still, can’t see how you can’t admire some Gillian Welch.
fucen tarmal
one thing about bluegrass,you don’t have any fakers, you really have to play to evolve into playing bluegrass.
trollhattan
@arguingwithsignposts:
This is pretty much a must-have for SRV fans:
http://www.amazon.com/Session-Albert-King/dp/B00000JTB2
I rue having never seen Stevie but I did see Albert, who opened for John Mayall at the first Winterland concert I ever attended. Sheer luck on my part since I didn’t even know he was on the bill. He got a surprising amount of airplay back in the day, at least in NorCal.
cleek
@ThresherK:
…and from Louis Armstrong to Billy Holiday.
nanute
Love SRV! The Austin City Limits show makes me cry every time I see it. What a tragic end to a great talent. Here’s something from a great lefty: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FU4zHu1aDII Hope the link works. John Mayall and Coco Montoya. Enjoy
nanute
@trollhattan: Thanks for that! Never heard it before.
trollhattan
@nanute:
I’m pleased as punch to share. The conversations between the two are as enjoyable as the music. Evidently they first interacted when SRV was still a teenager and if I recall the story correctly, had been pestering Albert’s manager to arrange a meeting for quite awhile.
Gone so long, the both of them :-(
Tim
The odd numbered dogs are the worst
I have had as many as four dogs at one time. My impression is that every odd number dog (1st, 3rd) is alot more work, every even number dog not so much. So one dog seems like way more dogs than no dogs, and three dogs seems like way more than two dogs, but two dogs isn’t much more than one dog, and four dogs isn’t much more than three dogs. Could have just been the personalities of the dogs involved, I suppose…
But I think when you get your third dog, you will notice it alot more.
Tim
@stuckinred:
Well, they’re religious, that’s saying something negative about someone around here ;-)
No, those guys are awesome, although I prefer to do the road-work using a bike instead of a car. Also, shave those scraggly beards. They’re terrible.
birthmarker
@geg6: Country died for me on 9/11. Since then , you might as well listen to the Christian station. The exception is Alan Jackson’s 9/11 song called “Where Were You.” I still tear up…
ciotog
Yeah, but if you get a dog, you’re a person with a dog. if you get a second dog, you’re a dog person. Especially if the dogs in question are over 30 pounds. People look at you differently, and possibly askance. It’s like having a fourth child, or a third cat, or getting a ferret.
asiangrrlMN
Love the vid. Very tasty.
@stuckinred: I would love to see Santana live; I do not, however, have any love for Steve Winwood. I’m sure the concert will be awesome, though.
As for season: Hot, thankyewverymuch. I wish I were a guy so I didn’t have to wear a shirt.
Iconoclast
Sorry, but hasn’t Carlos Santana used the same humbuckers-turned-up-to-12-playing-only-ultra-overdriven-single-notes sound for, oh, 40 years now? I know he’s a real spiritual guy, but c’mon… Ever try a Fender guitar, Carlos?
NobodySpecial
Just for ya’ll. The Rolling Stones with Eric Clapton!
Linky
Batocchio
Can’t go wrong with Stevie.
When I saw Peter Gabriel a few years back, his opening act was the Blind Boys of Alabama, who rocked.
joepaulsdad
Great SRV clip, thanks. Saw SRV in May 1988 at UConn. Here’s a Stevie clip that’s money, baby:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mGJ1Agr4j2E&playnext_from=TL&videos=JYhhonUmC0g