Widow Season

That's what Mommy always called it. Mommy was my first bartender at the Rodeo. As I remember her, she used to keep her son in a papoose while she slung drinks and taught me to "Set up my glasses." She used to play pranks on the other waiter -whom she had dubbed Princess, because-well, because he's a California Princess. They had a little war going on, prankwise. There used to be a jar of little babies in this here office that she had kept from a baby shower she held here at the Rodeo. As per pranks, I did get her good once calling in a reservation for 80.

"I can't take that large a reservation" said Mommy.
"How come?"
"Because 80 is just too many people." she said.
"Okay, how about two parties of forty?" I said, from my cell phone at the back of the restaurant, giggling with Yeattsy (thanks for coming to gig, Yeatts)
"That's still 80 people." She said, losing her penelope-like composure.
"Okay, okay, okay -how about forty parties of two?" I said.
"You don't seem to understand ..." and then we broke into peels of laughter before I could tell her to put it under Mike Hunt or Al, last name Kaholik.

Anyways, she called football season "Widow Season" because as she put it, "because wives become widows every Sunday until January." And I liked that. She had a way with words, ol' mommy. And she was quick with numbers too, as is evidenced by her quick division of eighty above. I just thought I'd mention it because this here blog has presumably widowed last week by all things football, which seems strange since Vince was just ressurrected and all.

Or was he ...?

We did play our gig on Wednesday. It went well. Thanks everybody for coming out! Tapio, whom I used to play lead for from high school into college, showed up, god bless him. I played on his album REVOLUTIONARY BOY, which is still a DIY classic in my opinion. We recorded it in Tom Kidleau's chicken coop in Harrisonburg, Virginia. Kenny Gibson played the motorcycle on one song. An album where gunning a motorcycle throttle counts as an instrument has got to be good, right? Good lyrics too. In fact, the whole night took on a surreal quality and it was sorta nice.

We converted the bartender down at C-Note, who was heard to remark, "I knew these guys were good, when I saw they had a clarinet player." Thanks boss, hopefully we'll keep bringing you bidness. The setlist has already been posted, so you can see what all we hit you with. With any luck, we'll have a whole new batch of songs for you come October. And you gotta love October. Candy apples, leaves falling, Baseball season wrapping up, and widow season just beginning, and Huckleberry Season just beginnning too. Where's Ray Bradbury when you need him with the imagery. It's also the time of pranks, I reckon, which makes me think of Mommy.

I met a widow today. She came to get me out of the apartment I was in. She was very distraught. The new people were moving in and she had a host of questions for me about what things in the apartment were. I had no answers for her as I was subletting the place from Craig's list. Along with a long list of grievances, she capped it with, "And I just lost my husband and strange things are happening."

So, I hauled my shit onto the sidewalk, offered her my condolences, gave her the keys and called a car service to take me and my belongings here to the Rodeo Bar, where I first met Mommy and where I am writing this now. But what struck me most about the whole exchange was her saying that "Strange things were happening." 'Cause it feels like they are. At least three people have told me how surreal they felt at our gig the other night. I just chalk it up myself. Things are in the soup, the huckleberry's thick these days and presumably will be through October. Thanks for your support ya'll! And if we missed you, hope to see you down at the C-Note in October -or should I say this Widow Season.

For Completionists

Thanks Huck fans for coming the other night!

This was the setlist from the C-Note this week:

--Time To Move On
--Ever Be True
--Missing Mississippi Mister
--The Swan Song
--Blueberry
--Railroad Train
--The Same Old Streets
--Sissy
--Hollywood
--Say Goodnight
--The Shape I'm In(Encore)

The origin of the Sucky Cowboys.

Just wanted to clarify Nate's origin of the Evil Empire a little bit. It's kinda funny because the Cowgirls wouldn't have exhisted if not for the Redskins.

In 1937 when George PReston Marshall moved the team to DC from Boston he wantedto do something to attract the female crowd. So in order to do so he established the first team Marching band. The fowllowing year came the unvailing of the first professional fight song. Written by Barnee Breeskin. (The orgiginal words were acctually penned by Marshalls wife, it orginally said, "Beat 'em, swamp 'em, touchdown! -- Let the points soar!" it once went, "Scalp 'em, swamp 'em -- We will take 'em big score / Read 'em, weep 'em, touchdown! -- We want heap more!") Anyway. In the late fifties Breeskin and Marshall had a falling out and he sold the rights to "Hail to the Redskins" to Clint Murchison, the same man trying to start the Dallas franchise. Murchison then held the song hostage from Marshall in return for the deciding approving vote for the Dallas Cowgirls.

Hence the bitter rivalry begins.

I just don't see how anyone could hate Riggo. Let alone classify him as evil. Jerry Jones, now thats evil. But Riggo no way! He's just your average fun loving redneck, hunter, soap opera actor. That 4th an 1 run for a TD against the Dolphins. One of the best plays ever, (to give credit where credit is due, so was Dorsett's 99 yard romp against the Skins) Plus the imfamous "Lighten up Sandy" to Juctice O'Conner just before passing out under the table at a pre confirmation party.

Theesman is an idiot. The whole name changing thing was lame, he is a terrible analyst on ESPN, all he does is ride whatever bandwagon is rolling at the time.

Watching Dexter Manley knock Danny White unconcious was one of my favortie momments in football. That guy was a wimp.

The Hogs...lame? Are you kidding me, they are perhaps the best offensive line unit EVER in the NFL. The Fun Bunch, the originators of the touchdown dance, ( And originators of the 15 yard penalty for team celebration), awesome. Dallas wishes it could have had such a trio of WRs on their roster at one time.

What class an organization shows to cut thier lifeblood, thier all time leading rusher, the identity of the team. He only wanted to play one more year, just to get the all time record, and they thow him out on the street. For a guy who isn't even in the NFL anymore. Great move, typicall of the suckiest bunch of sucks that ever sucked.

Hail to the Redskins!!!

Fan Fiction

I was going to regale everyone with the reasoning behind my patronage of the Dallas Cowboys. But after some research, I realize that my whole reasoning is based on a lie.

My big brother Ron was the one who picked the Cowboys as his team. But it was always told to me or I remember it as he was first a Vikings fan, but they moved and became the Dallas Cowboys. But I just looked it up(from Wikipedia:

"The city of Dallas, Texas, was granted an NFL franchise on January 28, 1960. Clint Murchison, Jr. and Bedford Wynne were the team owners and they immediately hired Tex Schramm to be the general manager and Tom Landry to be the head coach."

No mention of the Vikings at all! So what's the story? The Vikings were a team in 1961 also as an expansion team.

Huh. So all of this is just poppycock. That's crazy. But anyway, for whatever reason, we Shelkey's, we were Cowboys fans. Not Steeler's fans. And not Redskins' fans. But Cowboys' fans. We suffered through the tough years in the 80's. But with those great fun players like Ed "Too Tall" Jones, Danny White, Tony Dorsett, Jay Novacek, Randy White. These were PLAYERS.

And those Redskins' teams were so easy to hate. John Riggins. Joe Theisman. They were evil! A word on Joe Theisman. Only true Redskins haters know that his real name is pronounced Joe THEEZ-mun. But after he won the Heisman, he started letting people call him THIGHS-mun. What a faker. (Although, that was a frightening game when Lawrence Taylor broke his leg. Do you remember that game? So insane. That hit was monster.)

The Hogs? Ugh. The Smurfs? So lame. We even had some stupid restaurant in Springfield that Mark Moseley owned. And that theme song? Hail to the Redskins? Our music teacher Mrs. Banks made us sing it in music class and it grates me to this day.

But, two people I always liked were Joe Gibbs and Darryl Green. Find me a person who doesn't like Darryl Green. It's like disliking Kirby Puckett. Back when Kirby's character flaws weren't revealed.

All the heartache paid off though, because we then had the dynasty in the 90's. But soon, as my big brother Ron said, the team turned into the Crackwagon. And the team was falling apart. It was almost more fun when they were just awful but had some players you could get behind. I miss those guys.

It's like the Bad News Bears. You kind of miss them when they're awful. Once they start to be able to play, well, part of the charm is lost.

(Sidenote: Upon further research, have found out the Redskins used to play in Fenway Park. How wild is that?)

DALLAS SUCKS!!!

Oh god it feels so good. The first in 10 years in big D. F- those cowgirls. OH and by the way Eagles are a game back. Skins undefeated.

I'm Alive!!!

I just got a call from Equifax today. They are no longer disputing my livingness. I delcare this day, Sept. 19 to be a national holiday! Take the rest of the day off. Go home slaughter the fattened pig and feast tonight!

Love Sweet Love

I think we always wanted a dog. We begged our parents for ages. And of course they always said we weren't old enough and who would walk it and clean up after it? A dog was responsibility and we weren't ready for that responsibilty yet. We started dogsitting the pets of neighbors to prove how good we were about it. And earned a little cashola on the side. (Sidenote: I am alternatively shocked and horrified when I find out how much people pay little kids to do things. They either pay them way too much or way too little. Same with allowances. You'll hear about some kid getting $20 a week in allowance. When I was a kid we got like $5 or something.) Still, we weren't ready, they said.

But we whined and we cajoled, and little kids can be beasts about things like this and eventually our parents gave in. And so we got a dog. The dog's name was Muffin and he was a great big Old English sheepdog. The cutest thing ever. I think those cartoons of that sheepdog are pretty spot on accurate where the dog has to blow to get the hair out of his eyes to see. They really are that shaggy.

And little kids love to pet dogs. They love to chase them. And getting in the little nooks and crannies where they can get to, well little kids can get there too. Muffin, like a lot of dogs, liked the spot underneath the table. It's a place where there's not a lot of foot traffic but there's also good eating from time to time when people are careless with their food or maybe they are feeding some scraps all furtive style.

I like to think that was Muffin's sanctuary. His place to go to, to reflect, and mull on the life of a dog.

But Muffin was never alone under the table. No, there were three of us. Breny, Lou(my sister), and me. And one day Lou was there and she was presumably so happy to be alive and in the company of Muffin that she picked up his ear(the better to hear her with)and shouted in his ear, "I LOVE YOU MUFFIN!"

Sometimes love hurts.

Muffin wasn't altogether too pleased because his first reaction was to bite my sister. Maybe he was thinking we're under the table, no one will ever know!

Sometimes love hurts.

And Muffin never saw the Shelkey household again. I often wonder what became of Muffin. I also often wonder how it is dogs are suppose to act natural and behave around children because children are inherently bonkers. They are the type to tease dogs. To pull their tail. To yell in their ear. To step on them. To try and ride them. To hit them.

And we expect them to just sit there. And if they don't, we say, bad dog! Squirt them with lemon juice. Lock them in their cage. Their CAGE. Isn't that a little unfair? I mean, that's a textbook abusive relationship. What kind of message are we subconsciously sending our kids?

Sometimes love hurts.

(Sidenote: We had a 2nd dog, her name was Callie. Actually it was Calliope Mr. Spock Shelkey. A West Highland White Terrier for long, a Westie for short. These are those dogs that look like Scottie's only they're white. Anyway, since this is a band blog anyway, I thought I'd mention that Callie liked to sing. But she could only be coaxed to sing when you played the harmonica. Something about that lonesome sound made her want to howl. But the thing that blew my mind is that she would howl in key. I mean it really would be in whatever key you were playing. I wish she were still here so we could record Callie singing a solo for the band. What can you do? I have two cats, Roberto and Jake and although they are very interested in music especially the strings of guitars and the keys of keyboards. They have not sung for me yet. But maybe there's some instrument I haven't played yet that will coax them into song just like Callie and the harmonica. The search continues...)

The Cujo Wars (To Jersey or Not to Jersey)

We moved back to Virginia when I was round about eight, and our family were among the first folks in the development. In fact, the only person on the block lived next door and we knew him simply as "the colonel." As the name suggests he was retired military, living out his last years with his trophy wife. I would often, while playing Indiana Jones in the yard, see them walking down our street -a golf club for a cane, his cigar a permanent fixture on his lip. I think cancer got him, but I hate saying that because as Rilke says, "Lord grant each person their own personal death." I translate that as somebody having a meaning beyond the statistic. The way that Blanche Dubois says she will die of "eating an unwashed grape." Or the way that I always though I would die from a tick I brought home from the woods when I was a boy. I had explored those woods pretty thoroughly then. And by the time the colonel passed away -not only had the neighborhood bloomed up, but I had met my best friend, and we had discovered Cujo.

Cujo was a mammoth hollow tree just down the creek a ways. You could fit four kids inside that tree easy. It was damp and dark inside, but altogether amazing to us that nature could create such a thing. We spent part of every day in the summer, cooling off inside the shelter of that tree. Once, after an Autumn and Winter had passed, we went back to cujo only to be chased out by an owl we had woke up. How did cujo get its name? Because when we were walking beside the creek and discovering these things, my friend said to me, "This reminds me of cujo, man."

"What's cujo?" I says.

"You don't know Cujo?"

"No."

"It's this book by Stephen King about this alligator in the creek."

So, we named the tree after a book by Stephen King about an alligator in the creek called CUJO. Now, that version of the book doesn't exist so far as I know, but that tree was real. Though part of me wonders if it really was. Childhood being such a strange spell and all. And once that spell's broken, it gets a lil' hard to tell some things. But we named it CUJO nevertheless, as we had discovered it. This wouldn't matter except for what happened after the colonel died.

See, a new family moved in. They were from Jersey, and were comprised of the parents, the twins, an older brother you never saw, the grandmother and "Chipper." Now they also discovered a big hollow tree in the woods that they called "nine arm." Now NINE ARM was nothing other than CUJO. And so began the CUJO WARS.

Acorns fights, fisticuffs, truces, spying and vandalism ran rampant. Now, you could take the twins on a good day, but Chipper was a tougher matter. His real name was Mike. He was older, overweight, and if he sat on you, it knocked the wind out of you. Mike was formidable, and to be feared. But the twins were devilish, and troublemakers in their own right and had given away his kryptonite. His kryponite was the name Chipper. One had to use it sparingly because it created such wrath, but it worked like a charm. If you called him by Chipper, he would flush with shame and try and beat you up. But the shame won out and you could master him.

And the cause of the shame was the grandmother. She called him Chipper, and she was his weakness. She was senile and would oft be wondering the yard, thinking she was still in New Jersey. A little boy could happen upon her in the woods, as though they'd come upon some strange witch who was lost and just needed help getting back to New Jersey. She was lost, of course. Lost in that netherworld of the twilight of age. But she honestly had no idea that she was in Virginia. And Mike would always have to take her back to the house. She called him Chipper all the way home.

So, I guess she thought Virginia looked like New Jersey. But if she really thought that, she wouldn't have become so bewildered. And I guess in Jersey they call it NINE ARM, but I call it CUJO. And damnit, we discovered it in the first place. We were the native americans and here were these Jersey pilgrims calling something by another name and trying to take it over for themselves. But when you're a boy, you understand the power of a name; be it CUJO or Chipper. And names do have power to ward away those who would make everything the same. And I guess in their own way, they give each their own personal death. The colonel was the colonel, Cujo was Cujo, and Chipper was the mojo you could weild like a magic spell. Those were our "berries of hurting" to quote Shelktone's childhood wizardry. I think writing songs is just an extension of using words in that way. When they rhyme, somehow that's magical. I'm still learning what mojo's inside the name HUCKLEBERRY SLIM -but I know its got some, and that's enough for me. It sounds to me like those folks in Vermont found some kryptonite in the word Jersey too. In some ways, huckleberry to me, is just trying to Virginia New York City. But like Chuck Berry says the old folks say, "You never can tell."

Don't Jeresy Vermont

Last August some buddies and I piled into my '86 Lincoln Town Car (Oh, how I miss you) and headed up to Coventry, VT for the grand farewell to Phish. Our favorite pastime, let alone band, and the impetus for us to travel to and see so much of this country, including New Orleans and Jersey. New Orleans ain't nothing like Jersey, in fact I would say that outside the DC to NY corridor, there is very little like Jersey in this whole country, and I've seen just about all of it, having spent time in 43 of the 50. Nate is certainly right though when he's posits that its the people who make the place. The trip up to Coventry was calamitous. Huge thunderstorms, followed by 31 hours in traffic moving a total of about 250 yards. Then an announcement on the radio that we all had to go home, because there was no more room to put any of the cars. (Because of the most rain the Northeast Kingdom had seen in 25 years the entire grounds was a mud bog.) Very few went home. Many abandoned their cars on the highway, But most were taken in by the kindly farmers of the area. We went to get some gas and found out though the lady behind the counter that her husband was taking people in on his farm, for free. We went and parked the car in his cattle fields with about 100 other heads and he set us up with a bathroom, shower, breakfast, and a tour of the farm. For free, we each chipped in $10 for a ride to the show grounds and back each night in the back of a pickup. All along the ride approaching Coventry, as the traffic thickened and then clogged to a stop we would occasionally see these signs, that we thought were just hilarious, that said "DON"T JERSEY VERMONT" Its hard for a gathering of 40,000 kids stranded on the side of a highway to stay entirely clean, but people generally respected the request, and cleaned up after themselves and kept this beautiful land as green as we found it. It wasn't till I just read Nate's blog a minute ago, though, that I realized the deeper meaning behind all this. And it was linked right to the people on the Farms up there, miles from Canada, in the northeast of Vermont. Although the desire to have the trash cleaned up was a big part of it. I think it is the Jersey attitude that was the least desired up there. I mean, can you imagine, a bunch of Jeresy cow farmers, (the 3rd largest cattle state in the nation I recently found out) taking in a bunch of dirty hippies hopped up on the emotional ride of seeing the thing they lived for, and in many cases, means of living, end. Not to mention all the Shrooms, Acid, X, Molly, and who knows what else that were in the center of the huge cloud of pot smoke that hovered around the crowd like Pigpen. No way that would have happened in Jersey. Residents of the entire area accepted all these kids with open arms up there, glad to do it. In Jeresy they would have been left on the turnpike. As far as landscape goes much of the mid-Atlantic is very much the same. Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, all kinda a wash. But as soon as you head west to Tennessee things change and just get crazier from there. And nowhere have I found the same type of people. Across the board. I guess I couldn't really put my finger on exactly what the Jeresy mentality is, but if is mundane enough to be transferred to every other place without a definitive identity, I guess I see it as a bad one. Now I've had some great times in Jersey, and met some incredible people from there. But it does just seem to be the turnpike that comes to mind when I think about it. Dirty and fast. Im glad I got to be part of that craziness up in the Northeast Kingdom, I'm glad we didn't Jersey Vermont. I guess I wish that we could Vermont Jeresy.

Every Place Is Like Jersey

Our good friend Esmond is not much for traveling either. In fact, for many years he used to revel in the fact that he had been no further south than Harrisonburg, Virginia, no further west than Pittsburgh and no further North than Toronto and no further east than the Atlantic.

Then he got a job which had a lot of traveling for business. So he ended up going to a lot of places in the States. But mundane places like Detroit and Cleveland. And then he bit the bullet and went to Italy for a wedding. His first really big trip.

Through it all, one of the chief reasons he argued against traveling is that every place is like Jersey. Esmond is from New Jersey if you didn't already draw that inference.

He argued the topography of the land often looked the same. Trees looked the same. And they had all the same stuff. But how you got it was different. The money might look different and the accents might change but basically every place was still a lot like Jersey.

Now, all of this started in reaction to my going to London for fall semester our senior year of college. A bunch of us theatre types would end up going to London and I think he resented it. So he came up with this crazy theory. (Note: this is the same man who would drive around and shout out the window to couples, "You'll die alone!")

But I've done some traveling. I've been to Paris. London. Ireland. Spain. Amsterdam(for one Lost Weekend). And I have to say---he's kinda right.

I mean, there are a ton of places that you can look at and say---these streets are old. These buildings are old. It's quaint. But much of the U.S. is exactly like Jersey.

But that doesn't mean I don't think we shouldn't see it. Because really the things that make places places is the people. If you have a bad reaction to a town. If you say, I hate New York City. I don't really think you hate New York. I think you hate the experiences you've had. And you think the City is at fault. But it's not. That's just you making it so.

Just like when people say they hated highschool. They didn't hate highschool. They did not hate the physical place where that school stood. But they hated what people did to them. Or they hated the fact they were such a wimp. Or they hated that for whatever reason, The Powers That Be decided that for four years you should be covered in pimples resembling the face of a piece of pizza.

Maybe that's why people are always making fun of New Jersey. Because what they really are doing is making fun of themselves.

Wow, I'm brilliant.

Dis Dat And D'Other

I never took time away from work. And as per traveling, I loathed the very idear. In my mind, you don't need to go somewhere else to find what you're looking for, and your imagination can and should take you anywhere you could possibly get with Jet Blue. Still, I was murder on my co-workers -some of whom were (and still are) regular jet setters, with their seemingly monthly trips to the beaches of Brazil or the villas of Italy-until one year, as it was rounding on my birthday, and the suggestion box began fattening up with these ballots: "If you could go anywhere, where would you go?" And such and forth. In the end, they all chipped in and bought me a trip. In fact, I was told in no uncertain terms that the express purpose of the $300 bucks they raised was for me to take a trip. And I was to go to the only place I could see myself ever going, (and even then only if I had to) and that place was New Orleans.

But my rent was teetering on being in a rears, and that's where the cash wound up. Ergo, murder on my co-workers.

Flash forward to this summer. I had moved home on Groundhog Day this past year. Nothing had changed in the rent arena, I was jobless and after six years, New York had left me -well, underwhelmed. I hadn't worked in the bar in a year. I was playing with Huck Slim,(and that was good) but for whatever reason (maybe it was winter, maybe it was fate) something wanted me out of the city for awhile. So I moved home. Got a bullshit gig. Got out of hock. Saved up some scratch. Spent the scratch. And was pretty thoroughly in the doldrums when my old friend called me up with a proposition.

His mother had bought a hybrid car, and so was giving him her old guzzler. He had to drive it from Virginia to San Francisco. The last time he had gone cross country, he had driven his truck for 53 hours sraight en route to propose to his now wife, woke up careening through a cornfield in Kansas, rolled his truck, and escaped with a mere scratch on his elbow. But he managed to take a piece of the shattered windshield to place in the engagement ring, and hitched the rest of the way with Jimmie Johnson, a trucker from Colorado. But this round he wanted some company. He wanted me to come along, and he wanted to go the southern route through New Orleans. Nevermind that our trip coincided with his Kansas car rolling drive six years to the day. Never mind that I didn't have a leg to refuse him on and withdrew what was left in my account -a cosmically spooky balance of exactly $300. Never mind that we were pulling through Austin on my buddy's birthday. Never mind that by year's end, gas prices will be so astronomical that road trips won't even exist anymore. The whole trip smacks of coincidences like this. We were going through New Orleans and that's enough to get me.

We camped on Lake Ponchartrain. We drove over it into the city. A brass band greeted us with JUST MY IMAGINATION upon crossing over onto Bourbon Street. We ate muffalettas and po' boys. We walked into strips clubs, and walked out just as quickly because we were po' boys ourselves. I said to burn my bags the second we got there. I dreamt of moving there, and then thought against it because I knew the only way to make a living down there was to walk into the zoo of the French Quarter. But I fell in love, just like I knew I would. We woke up, swam in the lake, hung our clothes to dry in the backseat, and drove route 10 West to Austin where my old friend Phil Korshak would be celebrating his birthday. I did manage to take a seashell from the lake before we left.

And now that's all gone. Lots of folks I know will never see it. My kids will never see it. It's the cradle of jazz and the music was beyond anything I've ever heard. The television's like a bad mad max movie. 10,000 trapped in a football stadium with the water rising. A guy protecting his bicycle with a hatchet he keeps in his sock. Looting, rioting, you name it. I keep thinking of Randy Newman's LOUISIANA, 1927 ...

"President Coolidge come down in railroad train,
With a lil' fat man with a notepad in his hand,
President says, "Lil' fat man, isn't it a shame,
What the river has done to this poor cracker's land?

Louisiana, Louisiana,
They're trying to wash us away,
They're trying to wash us away"

Those words never felt more true. In hindsight, had I never left New York, there's no way I would have ever seen New Orleans. I had to be home, doing nothing, and depressed. Otherwise, I would have surely said No on the grounds of work or rent or money or some other such thing. But I was lucky enough to have absolutely nothing going for me at the time, and it afforded me what will be my only glimpse of the once great Nawlinz. I'm richer for it, and most thankfull. It will be sorely missed. Sorely missed indeed.