Low down blasted

After 1650 or so blog posts, I have to believe that the weakness in my game, both intellectually and in terms of my vocabulary, are now as readily apparent to my readers as they are to myself.

Throughout the construction of this blog, I have tried to keep the use of any fifty dollar words that I do happen to know to a minimum, so as not to sound like a pretentious twit a la George Will. I have tried not to repeat myself, but realize that I have in fact repeated several musical selections on occasion (ichikoo park and Willin' come readily to mind), slipping them in in the hopes of no one noticing. I like them. Speaking of music, I have been accused of being too bluesy, too twangy, with a marked absence of heavy metal and no polka that I can remember whatsoever.

I have also plied the same trodden ground topically, enough to lose more than a few loyal readers and at times to almost bore myself to sleep. Mea culpa. What do you want? It's cheap entertainment. I have played the jew thing on my banjo until some have cried for mercy, Kerry thinks my forays into the culinary arena smack of patrician, bourgeois gluttony and the conservatives in this country have been excoriated by me like they are a demonic killing plague from the death star.

I have offered up thousands of my photographic images to the blogosphere, all without any real functional copy write, and the artistic funny bone that I get to tickle is one of the personally most satisfying aspects of this literary device. That and possibly exposing people to good blues, bluegrass, jazz and rock and roll music, or at least the stuff I think is good.

I have had a loyal following that comments on occasion and I have tried to meet all comments with respect, and have even managed to stifle my natural propensity for combat and not react to the ones that are downright hostile. Like the guy last week who told me I thought that my shit didn't stink. Thanks for reading pal, want me to mail you a sample and clear it up once and for all? But I try not to get too defensive and understand the cover that anonymity brings to certain people and shrug it off.

I really appreciate all of you folks who do tune in regularly, readership is a steady 8500 page views a month, a scary number in a way that triggers no small responsibility for me. I am toying with having a blast party in the next several months, just to see who would show. All readers welcome. You could canonize me, shoot me or even maybe just share a glass of wine. But it would be interesting to see who the tree shook out.

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I have learned some new words recently. Brigitte came back from an energized (as opposed to its antonym, to enervate) two weeks at Burning Man and talked about her rumspringa (rumshpringe, rumshpringa, Pennsylvania Dutch), a term that the Amish use that literally means running around.* This refers to the time between the age of 16 and baptism when the Amish go out into the world, or among the english as they call it, (remember Witness?) and decide if they will live in the world at large or go back to the religious community.  It is also a time for courtship or to find a spouse. They tend to let their hair down during this period, even conceivably (thanks again Wicki):

• Wearing non-traditional clothing and hair styles (referred to as dressing "English")
• Driving vehicles other than horse-drawn vehicles (for communities that eschew motor vehicles)
• Not attending home prayer
• Drinking and/or using recreational drugs
• Engaging in pre-marital sex

*According to Wickipedia: A contraction of rum, an adverb meaning "around" (also used as a seperable prefix as in the case of rumschpringe), and the verb schpringen, meaning "to run" or "to skip."
The word rumspringa is closely related to the standard German word herumspringen for 'jumping around'. Omitting the he syllable leaving only the rum is widely accepted both in colloquial Pennsyvania Dutch German and in colloquial Standard German, and does not change the meaning of the prefix. The modern German word springen means "to jump"; herumspringen in this sense would mean something like "hopping around." In Swiss German as in some German dialects, springe however does - besides meaning "to jump" - also mean "to run". In modern German "to skip" would rather be translated with the verb hüpfen.


You have to love a good rumspringa, I certainly took mine when I dropped out at 16 and hitchhiked to Montana for a year, most fun I ever had and came back little worse for wear. Thank you Brigitte for the new word and the concept.


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I also heard a great moniker the other day for the large rolls of fat around a waitress's tricep in a jewish deli, think billowing limpid schmaltz cascading over a starched white server's garb, you know you've seen them, hanging over the heaping plate of whitefish salad. The person referred to them as "Hadassahs" and a better term may never be scripted.


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There is a cute young girl at the italian deli across from my gallery. She had some calligraphy tattooed on  the back of her neck recently. I try not to judge but something deep in my inner soul is so judgmental in these matters and I want to cry but these girls are so nice and I need to face my declining age and lack of hipness with the full realization that time has, in fact already passed me by and keep my mouth shut and I mostly do. 


Yesterday I noticed that the whole tattoo megillah had been brightly colored and I couldn't help but pry.


"Your mother must love that, Kelly?"


The sweet girl looked at me and said," Oh yes, she loves it, she is working on a full sleeve herself."


It was my time to be shocked. I sputtered, "Just exactly how old is your mom, anyway?"


She smiled at me, "She had me when she was really young, she is 35."


A thought dawned on me. "Kelly, do you realize that I am old enough to be your mother's dad?"


And with that advancing age crushed me down like a balsa wood statue in front of a D-8. A southern trailer park trying to stand up to a tornado. The generation gap hit me in the jaw like a Mike Tyson uppercut decking Rocky Marciano.


My worldview in this day and age is like a pleistocene dinosaur trying to breathe the same oxygen as Lady Gaga. There was a big competition and guess what, my anachronistic concepts about how things are supposed to work have not been getting rave reviews from the critics. 


If you would have told me that the current vogue of white guys, post hootie, wearing their caps to the side, blaring hideous rap music, affecting the worst vestiges of the black ghetto experience, would suddenly become such the rage that a person like me now feels ashamed not having a goatee, multiple piercings, spider webbed elbows and a shaved head.  What does it say about society that the prison experience is being glorified to such a degree, complete with the de rigueur carotid tattoo? The trendy waiter at the local coffee shop has reportedly had the words east and side tattooed on either knee.  Considering his sexual orientation, wouldn't this end down have been more appropriate? I never would have believed that things could have bottomed out to such a degree. Which brings me to the next word. Wigger.


According to wicki again:Wigger (alternatively wigga, whigger, or whigga), and also known as acting black is a pejorative slang term for a white person who emulates mannerisms, language, and fashions associated with African American culture – particularly hip hop in the United States, or the Grime/Garage scene in Britain. In short, it means "white nigger." The term is considered derogatory due to it being a portmanteau of white and nigger, in addition to its reflecting stereotypes of African American or Black British culture. Wigger is most often used in a pejorative manner, with the associated practices regarded as cultural appropriation. It is also often used in a racist manner, not only belittling the person perceived as "acting black", but also demeaning black people and culture by proxy.

I must confess that I may have heard this word before but had never considered its etymology or meaning. My gym, which is mostly older folks in a similar twilight state as your author when I work out, is almost entirely rap in the mornings. I feel embarrassed asking the young attendant for classic rock as the least of all sonic evils. Anything, I would rather listen to skynard for god's sakes. There is something surreal watching old folks pressing and curling under a bleak, ghetto, hip hop, musical landscape.

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Living on a dirt road, my car is pretty much continually dirty. Somebody saw fit to scribble this little nicety on the back window yesterday when I was having a libation at the Moose Lodge.

Have a great weekend.