Remember when I wrote about teaching my friend’s fifteen-year old nephew who lives in Florida some guitar stuff? Remember when I said that the young fella could draw and paint like nobody’s business? No need to humor me by pretending to remember. I wrote about it here.

Yesterday I received an e-mail from young Matt, and it turns out that he must have been practicing, because he’s playing in a band. He’s obviously still drawing too, as one of his drawings was chosen from 800 entries for honorable mention by Peter Max, the 60’s pop artist, in a Peter Max competition. He got to meet Peter Max, who autographed Matt’s entry. The kid can really draw.

And the really excellent news is that he has also started a brand-new blog, entitled “Like a Rolling Stone”. It would be nice if you’d drop by and say hello. He’s a real good kid.

Princess Cat, the longhaired, mystery celebrity look-alike, whom I was fortunate enough to meet at Eric’s Tennessee Shindig, has tagged me with this meme. Being the gott-damned prince that I am, I cannot refuse a request from such a lovely young lady. Besides, it’s Sunday, and I don’t feel like doing any heavy lifting.

Four Jobs That I’ve Had:
1. Interrogator
2. Oil Company Salesman (Chasing guys name Tony around the grease rack. Bad gig.)/drummer
3. Psychopharmacologist/drummer
4. Lawyer/drummer

Four Movies I can watch over and over again:
1. Fail Safe
2. Casablanca
3. Mister Roberts
4. Godfather I and II

Four T.V. Shows I love to watch:
1. Sopranos
2. Deadwood
3. Monty Python reruns
4. Just about whatever is on the History Channel

Four Website’s I read Daily: (Tough one; I read dozens of blogs every day)
1. Gut Rumbles
2. mtpolitics
3. Straight White Guy
4. Two Nervous Dogs

Four Places I’ve Been on Vacation:
1. Holland
2. Cape Cod
3. Florida
4. Hawaii

Four Favorite Foods:
1, Peanut Butter
2. Pizza
3. Tacos
4. Real Italian hot dogs (a Jersey thing)

Four places I’d rather be:
1. Key West
2. Maui or the Big Island
3. On a cruise ship anywhere
4. Anywhere near the ocean.

Four People I tag (if they haven’t been already):

Rather than tag anyone, I invite everyone to jump into the pool

As soon as we heard that Howard Dean, the Chairman of the National Democratic Committee, was coming to the Garden State, we dispatched one of our PRS Operatives to Newark Airport to see if he could spend a few moments with Dr. Dean.

He caught up with Dr. Dean as he waited for his limousine to be brought around.

PRS: “Dr. Dean, welcome to New Jersey. I’m from PRS and I wonder if I could ask you a couple questions?”

Dean: “PRS? Is that a public radio station?”

PRS: “No sir; it’s a blog.”

Dean: “Ah, a blog. I’ve heard something about them. All right, but I don’t have much time.”

PRS: “So, what brings you to New Jersey, Dr. Dean?”

Dean: “I’m here to meet with the State Democratic Committee. We are embarking on a campaign designed to bring truth back into government. The people are tired of George Bush and his rotten administration and the filthy lies they tell all the time, the scoundrels. The people need to be told the truth.”

PRS: “What are the truths you’ll be telling the people of New Jersey?”

Dean: “To start with, we’ll be making it clear to the people of New Jersey that Republicans are mired in a culture of corruption and they are taking money and outright bribes hand over fist from these awful lobbyists. We’ll be pointing out that no Democrat has taken anything from any lobbyist, ever, and that we are not the party of corruption.”

PRS: “No Democrat? Dr. Dean, this is New Jersey, which is run by Democrats, and the state has a history …”

Dean: “Then there is the big lie – the one that was told to the American people about weapons of mass destruction. A big, fat lie.”

PRS: “Dr. Dean, are you calling the President of the United States a liar?”

Dean: “Absolutely! Every time his mouth opens, out comes a big, fat lie. He lied about weapons of mass destruction being in Iraq. Liar, liar, pants on fire!”

PRS: “Let me see if understand this, sir. You’re saying that the President knew there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, but he told the American people that there were such weapons there to justify his ordering the armed forces to attack Iraq?”

Dean: “Absolutely. No doubt about it. He’s a liar. A no-good stinking liar.”

PRS: “And knowing that his lie would eventually be discovered, and that once his lie was discovered, he would suffer a political firestorm that could ruin his presidency, and yet he invaded Iraq anyway? Why would he do such a thing?”

Dean: “Because he’s stupid. He’s a liar and he’s stupid.”

PRS: “And yet, he was re-elected. How do you account for that?”

Dean: “That’s because the people who voted for him are also stupid.”

PRS: “You’re saying that everyone who voted Republican is stupid? That’s a lot of people, sir.”

Dean: “Yeah, they’re all stupid – every single one of them. Bunch of dumbass racist goobers who have no teeth and thirteen-year old wives. The ones who aren’t goobers are war-mongering, money grubbing pigs, who hate minorities and exploit the working class. Oh yeah, and they’re all liars too. I hate every single one of them and everything they stand for.”

PRS: “Do you really think that saying those kinds of things will help the Democrat party in the next election?”

Dean: “You sound like a Republican to me. I’ll bet you’re a damned Republican, aren’t you?”

PRS: “I really don’t see what my political preference has to do with our discussion, sir.”

Dean: “I knew it! You’re one of those stinking Republicans. You’re obviously a liar and a stupid bigot. I hate you and everything you stand for. This interview is over.”

PRS: “Thank you for your time, Dr. Dean.”

Dean: “Liar! Bigot! Rethuglican! Wingnut piece of shit!”

PRS: “Have a nice day, Dr. Dean.”

I’ve heard it said in everyday chit-chat that “everyone has a double”. Biologically speaking, barring the cases of identical twins and clones, exact doubles don’t exist.** Nevertheless, some peeps sure look a helluva lot like other peeps. I was reminded of that just this morning.

As I was doing the morning walk, a car pulled up alongside me, and the driver tapped on the horn, which always means that the driver is about to ask for directions. It happens often; more often than I would like, thank you. Nevertheless, being the goddamned prince that I am, I am always gracious, despite my abysmal lack of any sense of direction.

Today, when the driver rolled down the window and leaned over to look at me through the passenger window, I saw her say something, but it did not register. The reason that it didn’t register is because for a second or two, I thought I was looking at Kelley! Same hair, same face, same smile. In that one or two seconds, my mind raced, “Holy shit! What is Kelley doing in Jersey? What is she doing in my town? How did she know I’d be walking on this street? WTF??”

As soon as the momentary brain lock ended, I actually heard the woman’s voice, and it definitely was not the voice of the “Mouth of the Got-Damn South”. No, it was pure Jersey. I finally came to my senses and gave the woman the requested directions, but I have to assume that she must have thought me to be a bit on the “slow” side for having first stared at her, completely slack-jawed.

Weird, I tell ya.

**Note: While OJ Simpson never came out and said that “the real killer” was a twin, he did manage to convince the jury that the “real killer” must have been the one person of 170 million people who share his genetic markers.

I confess to being somewhat mystified by the whole blog genealogy thing.

I get that if A inspires B to blog, then A is B’s Blogfather (or Blogmother, but let’s stick with males for the sake of simplicity), and if B inspires C to start a blog then B is C’s Blogfather, making person A, person C’s grand blogfather. I take then, if A also inspires D to start a blog, then B and D are Blogsiblings, and person D becomes person C’s Bloguncle. If D inspires E to start a blog, then C and E are blogcousins.

Frankly, it makes my hair hurt.**

Anyway, I did note that Rube, of You Bitch (a Jekyll Island Blogmeet survivor), spawned a blogdaughter. What makes this a rather curious blogbirth is that Rube’s blogdaughter is his mom!! Ewwww That really makes my hair hurt.

My aching hair notwithstanding, you might want to pop over to Rube’s mom’s blog, and tell her what a nice boy her son/blogfather-ewww is.

** I’ll be damned if I know how Harvey keeps track of his Blog Family, which apparently is equal in size to the population of Vermont.

Update: This seems particularly approriate.

Al Gore and Hillary Clinton, each having recently taken the opportunity to do a bit of news-making demagoguery, I got to wondering how these two charmers get along – I mean, really get along. I imagined a setting in which they could unexpectedly run into each other, such as, for example, outside a Washington D.C. Starbuck’s.

I wondered what they would say, and (what they would be thinking).

Al: “Hillary! What a nice surprise. It’s great to see you.” (Dammit, what the hell is that miserable bitch doing here?)

Hillary: “Al!! Hello! Nice to see you too”. (Shit! I knew I should have had the coffee brought to the limo. Now I have to deal with this friggin’ asshole.)

Al: “So, how are you?” (Still the same satanic shrew?)

Hillary: “I’m doing just great, thanks. And how are you?” (I was doing OK until I ran into your sorry ass. I figure you’re probably as boring as ever.) “Been keeping busy?”

Al: “I’m doing fine, thanks. You know, a bit of teaching, making speeches – that kind of thing”. (One thing I’m not doing living in the goddamned White House, thanks to you and your shithead husband) “So, what have you been up to these days?”

Hillary: “Oh, you know … Same ol’, same ol’. The Senate keeps me pretty busy.” (I’m running for President, you dopey bastard. Don’t you read the freakin’ papers?)

Al: “Well you look terrific.” (Christ, she looks like shit.)

Hillary: “You look great too, Al.” (Christ, he looks like shit.)

Al: “Well, gotta run. See ya. Please give my regards to Bill” (the rat bastard).

Hillary: “Yep, I gotta get moving too. Bye-bye. Regards to Tipper (the ample-assed stupid cow).

Yes, I have joined the ranks of the Blown-Eyed Blodgers who will be attending the Blogmeet in Austin, Texas from April 28th – April 30th. As an extra added attraction, daughter TJ will be coming with me. It will be a Father – Daughter Road Trip, a first, to my knowledge, for a Blogmeet.

I hear that the folks in Texas don’t mind a guitar or two in the state, so I’ll be bringing mine.

See y’all there!

“Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be a liberal, and to have self- righteous blowhards like Ted Kennedy, Robert Byrd and Charles Schumer, speaking for me. And then I wake up screaming.”

Burt Prelutsky, “Liberals from Another Planet”

Via Fausta’s Blog

Tomorrow Jon Corzine will be sworn in as the Governor of New Jersey, a job he paid a lot of money to get and one for which he was willing to give up his U.S. Senate, which also didn’t come cheap. He takes office at a time when the state faces a massive deficit, has the highest property tax of all the fifty states, and has been plagued by corruption. During the campaign, he said that he had solutions for all of those problems.

I did not support Jon Corzine for Governor (or, for Senator either), but as a resident of New Jersey, I hope that he turns out to be as good for the state as he promised last fall he would be. After all, if he turns out to be a dismal failure, we all lose.

I just wish I could be more optimistic.

Jon Corzine went directly from Goldman Sachs to the U.S. Senate and, as such, he’ll have to learn his way around Trenton. This is also true of several of his appointees. On one hand, being an “outsider” may be a good thing, but on the other hand, the Trenton pols, political bosses and hacks (who saw to Corzine’s nomination and election) have been there for years, and they have a lot invested in maintaining the status quo.

The problem, of course, is that in New Jersey the status quo is synonymous with a bloated state government payroll, monstrous taxes, governmental inefficiency and flat out corruption. Because it is fair to say that corruption is at the root of many of the state’s ills, it is on this front that Jon Corzine has an opportunity to make a clear showing of his commitment to keep what ultimately may be his most important campaign promise, namely to clean up the government.

One would expect that a Governor committed to draining the Jersey Political Swamp would choose as his Attorney General a person with a track record of ferreting out and prosecuting corruption and who is not generally considered to be a strong partisan. Unfortunately, Zulima Farber, Jon Corzine’s nominee for Attorney General is not such a person.

While I do not doubt that Ms. Farber is a good lawyer (she is, after all, a partner in a prestigious New Jersey Law firm), her law enforcement experience is limited to having spent three years as a county prosecutor thirty years ago.

The Asbury Park Press did not equivocate when it editorialized, “Farber is grossly unqualified for the job.” In addition to citing her limited law enforcement experience, the editorial reminded us of the last time Ms. Farber was in the news:

Farber, you may recall, was nominated for a state Supreme Court vacancy in 2003 by former Gov. James E. McGreevey. He withdrew the nomination after he learned a bench warrant had been issued for her arrest because of an unpaid speeding ticket. It also came to light that Farber’s driving record included more than a dozen motor vehicle violations, mostly for speeding or traffic accidents, and she had her license suspended three times.

The editorial chalked the appointment up to politics:

Naming Farber, who was born in Cuba, is a payback to the Latino community — Assembly Speaker Albio Sires, D-Hudson, and Rep. Robert Menendez, D-N.J., Corzine’s handpicked successor for his U.S. Senate seat, in particular. The state’s Latinos were incensed when McGreevey withdrew his nomination of Farber for the Supreme Court seat because of her driving record.

Time will tell whether Governor Corzine can fix this badly broken state and whether he can do so without taxing us all into poverty. I sure hope he can.

Trogdor?

It appears that I never got the memo.

Via Rita.