Parrothead Ramblings

Parrotheads putting their best efforts to work for the needy at UMOM!

A great number of Arizona Parrotheads converged Saturday on the United Methodist Outreach Ministry in central Phoenix, spaghetti-laden crock pots, garlic bread, and desserts in tow to help that worthwhile organization feed about 230 folks, people who might be a little less fortunate than perhaps most of us are. And feed them we did, until everyone got their fill (including the Parrotheads), and we still had a few metric tons of delicious pasta left over. A great time, rewarding and enjoyable, was had by all. Well, almost all.....and that's where this story begins. It may not be a 100% accurate depiction of the event, but The Crime Dog never lets the truth get in the way of a good story.

One of our more delightful participants was the always fetching Lexy the Clown, colorfully arrayed in makeup, clown suit and hat, Mardi Gras beads in hand, making the day just a little brighter for a bunch of lovely children. She was, as usual, fantastic. A powder room break brought Lexy the Clown in touch with a little girl who required some assistance. One part of that was assisting the munchkin in getting some hand soap out of the dispenser, mounted too high on the wall for her to reach. As the child expectantly extended her cupped little hands to catch the glob of soap, Lexy the Clown kindly gave the dispenser button a push, and......

somehow blasted the poor kid in the face with it.

The munchkin erupted in a hair curling screech, as you might expect after getting zapped in the eyes with a tablespoon of hand soap. It gets a little foggy what happened then. I prefer to visualize it as several frantic Parrotheads filling the sink with water, holding the child by the ankles and dunking her head up and down in the water several times to get the soap out of her eyes, but my guess it was not quite so dramatic.

Now, let's play role reversal. Let's say it's.....hmmmm...how about Woody in the clown suit instead? Visualize this:

A middle-aged man in a clown suit, pockets full of suckers and pretty beads, takes a little boy into the bathroom. Seconds later, the kid shrieks, other adults enter to help, only to find Woody the Clown grappling with a hysterically screaming four year old boy. In the mens room.

Stop mister! Please! You're HURTING me! Why did you squirt that on me? AIIIEEEE!!!

I'm guessing we'd be seeing Woody on the evening news, verge of tears, makeup running, holding up a little sign with his name and booking number on it. Both frontal and profile. No reward and no bail.

Wish I was somewhere than here, down in some honky tonk sippin' on a beer....
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Margaritaville promotion, Buffett show, grandkid's birthdays....my feet haven't stopped moving for DAYS. But who's to complain? These are some of the things that make life enjoyable.

TFMCD and I turned the whole Margaritaville promotion/Buffett concert thing into a getaway. Took Thursday and Friday off, snagged a room at the Marriott Renaissance, and just stayed over. Let me tell, you, that place has some service.

We left our car with the valet Wednesday night, and Thursday morning around 6:30AM, I realized my phone was still in it. I called downstairs, told the valet my problem, and within five minute he was at the door, my phone in hand.

It gets better.

After the Margaritaville promotion, we headed back to the hotel for a little power nap. As I passed the front desk, I asked the attendant there if they could send a fan up to our room. No problem with the A/C, I explained, we just like more air circulation than most folks. The attendant said she was not sure if they had any, but would do what she could.

After a quick nap, we headed back over towards Margaritaville. A valet, whom I have no recollection of ever having met, saw me at the door and told me he had a fan for me, but would have to put it together. I thanked him, and was wondering how he even knew the heck I was.

When we returned to our room that afternoon, a large floor fan was awaiting us, ready for action. Impressive.

But it still gets better.

As we were leaving for the concert, the valet asked me how the fan worked out. I thanked him and told him it was great. He then told me they didn't have any in the hotel, so he had gone to the store, purchased one, assembled it, and took it up to our room.

Any question where we'll be staying every time we decide to hang out overnight on the west side?
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A big AZPHC Phinz Up! to the wonderful people at Packages From Home. Heroes helping Heroes.

So I'm with a bunch of my Parrothead Phriends Saturday at Packages From Home, packing up goodies to ship off to America's True Heroes - the men and women of our U.S. Armed Forces in Iraq and Afghanistan - when I suddenly hear raucous, convulsive laughter from the far end of the packing table. I glance that way, and I see Crash and a few of the fine folks from Packages From Home yukking it up. Cool.

But then I see it....that sideways glance from Crash that lets me know beyond any doubt that it is I, the Crime Dog, who is at the butt of this mirth.

Turns out one of the fine folks from Packages misheard my nickname, and had apparently asked Crash something like "Which one is Crap Dog?" I may not have correctly stated the quote, but you get the sentiment. So, for the rest of that day, and much of that fine evening, I was "The Crap Dog." Remains to be seen how long THAT one will hang on.

In retrospect, I'm beginning the think the "Cream Dog" moniker hung on me by the LA club a few years ago at Parrot Grande is downright preferable.

Hey, call me anything! We packed up 50 boxes for our troops Saturday. Everything else pales in comparison.
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We Parrotheads know how to start early and finish late.

When I was a kid growing up in New Mexico, there were a few days I really dug, and looked forward to all year. Christmas, of course, a no-brainer. The last day of school. First football game. My birthday, naturally. And then there was the first week of September - the week that the Eastern New Mexico State Fair opened. It was a mega-huge day for kids, because they actually gave us the day out of school to go to the parade and the first day of the fair. A kid could decorate up his bicycle and actually enter the parade - ride that sucker right down the middle of Main Street, baby! No helmet, gloves, or knee pads required!

Forty-plus years later, I can still clearly remember the anticipation, the excitement, and the energy of the days leading up to the big show, surpassed only by the sounds and smells of the fair itself. Carnies barking, music playing, bingo callers shouting out numbers, big diesel engines spinning up "The Bullet" and "The Round Up" into screaming, pants peeing fear and excitement, and the PA announcer at the rodeo calling out who just got thrown from a saddle bronc. I can still smell the stock barns (which you can turn your nose up to, but it just smells like home to me), the burning diesel fuel, delicious cotton candy and popcorn, and of course the savory, sizzling smell of the Kiwanians grilling those delicious burgers over by the Bingo tent, near the Commercial Exhibit building. Who knows, maybe this will be the year I snag a kiss on the haunted house ride, or under the bleachers at Coca Cola Field Man, what I wouldn't give to relive Fair Week one more time before taking that big dirt nap in the sky.

It's been said that "you can never go home again." True enough. I know if I went back there, it wouldn't be nearly the same. It would be too loud, dusty, annoying, and small, even though it seemed so gigantic when I was a 12-year-old. It's better that the fair just lives in my memory, where it still exhilarates me in my middle-ageness.

But guess what? I'm a Parrothead! I have Buffett Concert Week! That same excitement and anticipation, the same exhilaration all week long, looking ahead to the big show! I'll take the day off, just like when I was 10. I'll hang out at Margaritaville all morning, sipping a few adult beverages, palling around and palying grabass with Wayners, Steve-O, Rick and the rest of the kids. Wondering if maybe my special girlfriend will give me a secret kiss in that big dining room sailboat. Parade? You bet! All around the parking lot of Cricket Pavilion will be one big parade of suntan-oiled, Margarita-mixing, shot luge riding, grass skirt wearing, flag waving, fin waving, crustacean and cheeseburger eatin' Parrotheads. Hell, there'll probably be as many folks in the parking lot as in my whole home town!

Are you feeling it now? Maybe just a little? Yeah, I thought so.

Meet me at Margaritaville!
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Yeah, it's me. Still kickin'. Still thinking about writing Parrothead Ramblings again. Lessee....tomorrow we're helping Packages From Home, then a board meeting, then a happy hour, then a club meeting....Sunday is Mother's Day. Not much free time.

Guess I'll have to think about it.

And thanks, Eric from the house concert.
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Seems our good phriends the O'Malley Babes have themselves a Top 10 video!

OK, so maybe they haven't broken out on MTV or VH1, but they managed to earn themselves a spot in the Top 10 of the High Fives On the High Seas video contest! Kudos, my phriends! Well played!

Now it's up to the rest of us to make sure their video has a shot at numero uno. Just slide right over to the contest, watch their video, and submit your vote. The top three vote-getters make it all the way to none other than than those lovable Hosers, The Barenaked Ladies for a final vote.

So what are you waiting for? Go there, do that!
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After that headline, I doubt I need to say anything else.

The TV ad being continually run by 102 proponents is at once laughable and insulting. It indicates that marriage is solely for the purpose of procreating and raising a family. That the best argument you have for this oppressive, liberty-hating piece of bullshit legislation?

If you're right, and if that's the purpose of marriage, shall we also outlaw marriage by anyone unwilling or incapable for whatever reason of procreating?

Ridiculous.

Memo to Bible thumpers (or Book of Mormon thumpers, as the case may be):

Leave people alone. Stop trying to force your morality down everyone else's throats.
Go to your churches, worship the way you want, raise your families as you see fit, and shut the hell up. Go away, and I promise to do the same.

Any questions?
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Well, I'm still here and still dancin'. Today is the first day that my leg has actually looked relatively normal, and I feel good. I had no idea when I went to the ER last Monday that I would be a guest for anything more than a few hours, but took one urgent care, two ER's, four doctors, countless PA's and nurses, six days in the hospital, five shots in the gut, and I think we're up to seven antibiotics now. I don't even want to know how much this cost.

The folks at Mercy Gilbert were terrific. They were were attentive and patient, always answering my stupid questions and laughing at my lame jokes.

The morning I arrived at the ER, the nurse working the front desk took one look at me, and before I could say a word, asked "So, having a problem with your right leg?"

Wow. Is it that obvious?

"It looks like it's on fire."

It is. Please put it out.

The ER doc walked in, took one glance at my leg, said "I'm keeping you," scribbled something on a clipboard, and left. I wonder how much THAT cost me?

So, they got me up to a room, and my nurse came in and asked me all of the same questions I had already answered about six times, but then out of the blue asked:

"Do you feel safe at home?"

It took me a second to process the question before I could answer with a Huh?

"Do you feel safe at home?"

Um....yeah? It's like the only place I DO feel safe.

"We have to ask."

That night, the charge nurse came in to visit. What a nice woman, very sweet. She was one of those "touchy-feely" types, which is cool with me, but she apparently forgot why I was there. She had her hand resting on my left knee, and as she turned to leave, she good-naturedly slapped my right leg. Naturally, I screamed like a Girl Scout at a Jonas Brothers concert. She could not stop apologizing, even though I assured it really didn't hurt so much as it startled me. An hour or so later, she stuck her head in the door and asked

"Mark? Can I ask you something and you promise to be 100% honest with me?"

Now, I'm thinking somebody broke into the morphine cabinet and I'm a suspect.

Um, sure.

"Has your service here been good? Do you have any complaints or problems whatsoever?"

I assured her everything was fine, no problems, it was The Phoenician with drugs and motorized beds.


Interesting observations:


Did you know that the guy at Urgent Care will charge you your $75 deductible just to tell you he can't do anything for you and you need to go to the ER? I didn't.

I never knew prior to this that they have absolutely no healthy food whatsoever in the hospital. The just serve you the same shit that probably got you there in the first place. I guess maybe it's good for return business.

Did you know you can taste some of the stuff they put in your IV? Even the clear saline they flush it with tastes like cheap vodka. The worst was one of the antibiotics, which tasted very much like an old Converse All Star high top sneaker that had just been worn by a dude nicknamed "ToeJam" in a three-day basketball tournament held in a feed lot.

Did you know ultrasounds hurt? Especially when you're a guy, you have a leg infection, and it has managed to work its way all the way up that place that makes you a guy. That's when the ultrasound lady jams that thing in your crotch so hard you can feel it in the back of your throat. It was quick, though, and I got her to admit that it would have taken much longer had I been, say, Matthew McConaghey.

Did you know that high dosage IV antibiotics can also kill the bacteria that you need in your colon for it to work properly? And if that happens, you can get something called infectious diarrhea. And if that's not unsavory enough, one of the ways they cure it is by collecting healthy shit from a relative and pounding it up your ass to replace the missing native bacteria. Doesn't that sound like a hoot? Sorry I missed out.

And, on that note.....Good Day!
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