It's not easy to experience the confusing emotions of sacrifice, joy and relief in the same moment. But that's exactly what videos like this make me feel.
I go down a lot of rabbit holes on YouTube—Springsteen, Taylor Swift (yes I'm a Swiftie), standup comedians, German Shepherd videos, versions of Stand By Me and Tracks of My Tears—but the ones that affect me to the core are of soldiers returning from overseas, surprising their families and relatives.
These joyful, tearful reunions remind me of the sacrifice, real sacrifice, our soldiers and their families make everyday. Even during an awful period of time when a bone-spur addled, dementia-ridden, brainless, spineless, morally and financially bankrupt, rapist, convicted felon and overall cowardly piece of shit who thought of them (and still does) as "suckers" and "losers" was elected for reasons I'll never understand.
Anyway, the minute these families realize what's happening, you can see and practically feel the fear and uncertainty lift from them as they run to hug their loved ones who've done the one thing they hoped and prayed for: they came home.
They fight wars they didn't start. They're at the whims of politicians who have no idea what it means to sacrifice or defend honor. And they go back time and time again because it's their duty. It makes me realize I need to stop complaining about tough days at the office.
It doesn't matter what side of the aisle you're on, or what color your state is. If you have a beating heart, you can't help but be moved by videos like this.
God bless all our soldiers.
And just for the record, I'm not crying. You're crying.
I've probably posted this before—I tend to repeat myself—but I grew up on the mean streets of West L.A., north of Wilshire. My home now is the first house I've ever lived in, although not the first one I've ever owned (whole other post).
Like every new and experienced homeowner eventually learns, homes are like Disneyland: they'll never be finished. A house is a living organism, its own ecosystem that requires regular, constant maintenance to keep living and thriving.
To which I say yeah yeah, sure sure.
For some reason there are people in the world who know how and, even more baffling, want to do everything themselves when it comes to home maintenance.
Seriously, that's just crazy talk.
There are more than a few household things you'll never catch me doing:
Restaining hardwood floors. Sure, inhaling the wood finish fumes is tempting, but no.
Tuning up the roof tiles. No thanks. I have neuropathy in my feet, and have enough trouble walking on flat ground. When I think of myself walking and trying to balance my slightly fuller physique on slippery roof tiles, one song keeps popping into my mind.
Changing out a sprinkler head is also a no go. It's tougher than it looks. There's alignment, positioning, measuring and water pressure involved. Plus since we now use detergent from Trader Joe's instead of real detergent, I just can't risk the grass stains.
Plumbing? I have people for that. Same with electrical. And heating. And airconditioning. Although I do change the air filters all on my own. In fact I custom order them a half inch smaller on each side so they fit easily and I don't have to try to jam them in while balancing on my step ladder.
I know. I'm writing my acceptance speech now.
Another thing you won't find me doing is mowing the lawn. We have an excellent gardner who does a fine job without all the sweating and swearing that would inevitably accompany my efforts.
Here's the funny part. Even though I avoid mowing the lawn myself, I get a tremendous sense of satisfaction out of watching a runaway lawn get mowed down to size by SB Mowing.
Spencer from SB Mowing is a gardner who's sprung to fame on Instagram and YouTube. He lives in Kentucky, which besides moonshine, the Derby and, ironically, bluegrass, is also famous for having two of the worst senators in the history of time—Mitch "Mr. Freeze" McConnell and Rand "Yes sir Mr. Putin!" Paul. Although admittedly with Ted "When's the next flight to Cancun?" Cruz and John "Leave the oil company money in a plain envelope" Cornyn, Texas does give them a run for the money.
I may be getting off point here.
Anyway what Spencer does is find wildly overgrown or neglected lawns once a week, then asks the homeowner or a neighbor what the story is and if he can cut it down to size for free. He films the entire process in time lapse, and then displays truly breathtaking, incredibly satisfying before and after stills at the end of his videos (the YT videos run quite long - the four minute one at the top is one of the shorter ones).
Watching him work I can almost smell the freshly cut grass, as if I'd done it myself. Which as we've established, ain't happening.
On his website, Spencer tells his origin story, promotes the companies that make the equipment he uses and, like any good YT or Instagram star, sells mowing merch.
I don't know if it's watching someone actually finish something they start (you can do that?), the fact he makes gardening and lawn equipment look fun and cool (you can do that?), or his obviously disciplined work ethic (you can have that?), but watching him bring these lawns and their properties back to life is endlessly entertaining.
I know what you're thinking. I'm going to end this post with some corny, lawn-related pun.
Like his business is really growing.
Or when he's done filming his work he yells "Cut!"
Maybe even say he was a little green when he started.
But I won't. I'm keeping this one pun free. You know, in case Spencer keeps his clippings.
For the life of me I don’t understand why YouTube isn’t called RabbitHole. I can’t tell you how many of them I’ve gone down late into the night when sleep seems to have lost my address.
Well, I could tell you but it’d just be embarrassing. Although if you’ve followed this blog for any length of time, you know embarrassing isn’t necessarily a dealbreaker.
Anyway, I was going to do a post about my favorite song in the world by a certain gravel-voiced singer from New Jersey, Thunder Road. And I was going to include several versions of it like I’ve done in the past for songs like Tracks of My Tears, Unchained Melody and I Can't Make You Love Me.
That’s when I came across a TR cover by Matt Nathanson.
I’m not particularly fond of Springsteen covers, but Matt Nathanson’s version grabbed me immediately. In the video, there’s a bit of a preamble to the song that showed me humor, and then heart, with a voice that’s as emotional as it is enjoyable.
Buckle up, down the rabbithole I go.
His song Used To Be hits home hard, as does the winsome Blush. Besides, how can you not like a singer with a song where the first line is “I fell asleep, had a dream Bill Murray and I were friends….” I know, right?
Ask anyone who knows me and they’ll tell you that I’m a talented writer and good looking, but could stand to lose a few pounds. Wait, I may have gotten off point there. What I meant was they’ll let you know when I find a song or a singer I like, I play them into oblivion until I have to take a break from them for a while.
Honestly, I just don’t see that happening with Matt Nathanson. He’s one of those singers you can’t help but wonder why he’s not a bigger star, and why his songs aren’t playing everywhere.
If you know anything about me, and if you don’t by now you have no one but yourself to blame, you know that for the most part, in life and online, I'm a social butterfly. I comment, I post, I joke, I engage.
What I also do is scroll, sometimes doomscroll, first thing when I get up and last thing before I go to bed. If I'm up in the middle of the night—did I say if? I meant when—I also take a look at what I might’ve missed since I went to bed.
I’ve spent too many hours, way too many hours, going down a YouTube rabbit hole. And even though I’ve now seen every version in existence of Springsteen singing Twist & Shout, all the Breaking Bad and Friends blooper reels and discovered some of my favorite artists I wouldn’t have known about otherwise (Paul Thorn, John Moreland), I’m not getting those hours back.
So I’m reclaiming my time. I’m going on a social media cleanse for a bit, and see if I can’t put that reclaimed time to better use. SPOILER ALERT: I know I can.
I have close friends who've found themselves in Facebook jail for thirty days, and at first it sounded awful. But right now, honestly, no Facebook for thirty days sounds like heaven.
My friend and great writer Kathy Hepinstall, who's probably written another book in the time it's taken you to read this sentence, signed off of Facebook for good awhile ago. I didn't get it then, but now I recognize that, as usual, she was ahead of her time.
The first step will be to delete the Facebook, Messenger, Twitter and Instagram apps from my phone. I'm all about easy, but if I want back on I'm going to make myself work for it. And I'm not looking for more work.
As much as I'd like it to be, it won’t be an entirely cold turkey withdrawal. I'll still post the occasional link to my Rotation and Balance blogpost, but only because my seven readers demand it. What I won't do is sneak back on to see how many people liked it, cause seriously, where's the percentage in that?
Because I do what I do for a living, I’m expected to maintain a certain level of social media awareness. So occasionally I'll look but not comment. I’ll be stealthy, ninja-like and silent—just like you wish I was in real life.
You won’t even know I’m there. And I won’t be unless my job absolutely requires me to take a look.
I realize this is going to put a big dent in my wishing you a happy birthday/happy anniversary game, but it's the price I'll have to pay. And just to make sure I don't miss yours, happy birthday and happy anniversary in advance.
One of my best friends since elementary school has never been on Facebook. Never had an account, never logged on. I asked him about it one time, and he said, “Don’t worry, I’ll be your friend in real life.”
So, if you need to get hold of me, you can always text or email. We can even set up a time to have a meal, face-to-face. I realize you'll have to change out of pajamas to meet me, but that's just the price of being my friend.
Anyway, not a total goodbye to social media, just so long for now.
And of course, like a wise man once told me, I'll still be your friend in real life.
Some days, this whole "work from home" thang is extremely productive for me. From the minute I hit the keyboard in the morning until I close up shop at night, my fingers are flying fast and furious writing spellbinding, innovative, entertaining and motivating copy that sells the spectacular printers, scanners and projectors made by the global technology company I work for.
Afterwards, at the end of the day as the sun takes its bow and gives way to the coming night, a feeling of great satisfaction and accomplishment washes over me, and a smile slowly dials its way up to full brightness as I bask in the glow of a job very well done.
That's some days. Today wasn't one of them.
Instead, today was the other kind—the one where, despite my best efforts, my mind has a mind of its own and decides to be a few miles south of focused as we spiral down a YouTube rabbit hole for hours on end and see where it takes us.
Those days hit every creative person I know. And I think I speak for all of us when I say that when it happens, the best thing to do is just buckle up and go along for the ride.
For some reason, probably because she hosted Saturday Night Live last week, Adele was on my mind. There was a sketch on the show spoofing The Bachelor, and at the end of it Adele starts singing while she walks off the stage and into the audience. It was a great, unexpected moment—especially for the audience.
I'd never describe myself as an Adele fan, but every time I hear her sing I'm dumbstruck at how stunningly beautiful her voice is. And even moreso by how effortless she is in her performance. She doesn't need to go through wild gyrations, have two dozen backup dancers, recorded backup vocals or a blinding laser light show. All she needs to do is stand there, share her gift and belt out her songs in that voice I can't seem to get enough of.
Okay, so maybe I am an Adele fan.
The song in the video up top, When We Were Young, is one of my favorites and a great example of the kind of performance I'm talking about.
I'd also forgotten about it, but today in my YouTube travels I was reminded Adele is also a bawdy Englishwoman with a cheeky sense of humor. I rediscovered a video I'd seen a few years ago of her auditioning at an Adele impersonator contest in disguise. It's funny, poignant and generous of her as the women she's auditioning with are obviously die-hard fans and slowly realize who one of their competitors is.
But then again, once you hear that voice—Hello—it's hard not to.
If you’ve been following this blog for any reasonable amount of time—and really, if you have you need to get outside more—then you already know I have what we could accurately call a slightly compulsive side to my otherwise sparkling personality.
Whether it’s food, movies, jokes, the crap tables or in this case, music, I’ll latch onto something then run it mercilessly into the ground, usually driving everyone around me crazy along the way.
I think by now you know a certain gravel-voiced singer from New Jersey is one of my life long obsessions. I don’t even want to think about the money, time, travel and effort that’s gone into following him around the country for years. I’m not complaining: it goes without saying, even though I’m going to say it, that I’d do it all again in a heartbeat.
Especially the trips where I got double airline miles.
Well, the bad news for those around me on the friends and family plan is I believe I may have found another artist I can see myself getting that obsessed about. His name is Paul Thorn.
Gravel voiced, bluesy, honest, beautifully written songs that speak directly to and from the heart, he’s the real deal. In a world of singer/songwriters who should be wildly famous and popular, Paul Thorn is right up there at the top of the list.
How did I find out about him? Funny you should ask. I was surfing YouTube for a funky Donny Fritts video, as one does. The video I found was a song called Temporarily Forever Mine. I loved the idea of the title, and it was a beautiful song. I noticed it’d been written by some guy named Paul Thorn.
For the next four hours, I went down a YouTube rabbit hole watching his videos over and over (compulsive, remember?). I was hooked.
I went to his website, paulthorn.com, to see where he was touring. Come to find out the only Southern California show he was doing on his current tour was at a club called Belly Up in Solana Beach, near San Diego. On a Monday night. Not the best night or the closest venue, but it didn’t matter. I was going to see him and nothing could stop me - except for the torrential rainstorm that decided to hit the night he was playing. I couldn’t leave work early enough, and even if I could have traffic was impossible.
So, disappointed though I was, I checked his site again to see if there were any other cities I could catch up with him. Turns out, while I was sleeping, he added a Newport Beach show just two nights later.
Long story long, I scored two tickets to the sold out show. The wife couldn't join me, so I invited my friend Eric - a fine musician in his own right - and we went and saw him. It was spectacular. He performed an earlier album of his in its entirety, as well as several other songs of his. And one Jackson 5 song, which made me love him more.
You'll notice I haven't done any Jason Statham jokes. First, I'm pretty sure he's heard them all. And second, he was a professional boxer who at one time went six rounds with Roberto Duran, so I don't want to upset him.
Anyway, here are a few videos to give you a little flavor of what I'm talking about. I hope you like him as much as I do.
And should you decide you want to see him live, just say when. I’m in.
I’m in the minority, but I feel sorry for M. Night Shyamalan. I know, it’s hard to feel sorry for a Hollywood wunderkind who showed the kind of promise, made the kind of money and then crashed and burned the way he did. But I do.
I thoroughly enjoyed three of the ten films that Night’s directed. That’s at least one more than most people.
Like almost everyone, I loved The Sixth Sense. Even though I knew the secret from the very first time I saw the trailer (Haley Joel Osment looks at Bruce Willis and says, “I see dead people.” Hello? What do you need, a roadmap?), the mood, writing, look and secrets in the film were spellbinding.
His next, Unbreakable, was also a keeper. For any comic book or superhero fan such as myself (Comic Con again this year?! Why yes), the ending and reveal of who Samuel L. Jackson really was didn’t exactly come as a surprise. But it was still thrilling, as is the idea of the long-talked about sequel.
This third film is where I part ways with almost everyone I know. Signs. I liked this story of a man, Mel Gibson, who once was a man of the cloth but now finds himself questioning his faith. That’s what the movie was about, despite the fact it was sold as an alien invasion, sci-fi film. There is nuance, genuine heartbreak (SPOILER ALERT: I dare you to keep a dry eye as Gibson is talking to his wife before she dies) and redemption.
With these first three successes (yes, Signs made money), Night was allowed to write, produce, direct and often give himself larger acting roles in his films than he should have, seemingly without any supervision from the studio. From The Village (a rip-off of this Twilight Zone episode), to The Happening (which wasn’t), to The Lady In The Water, to The Last Airbender, each film stunk up the place more than the next.
Part of the problem was Night tried to duplicate the big twist/reveal ending of Sixth Sense in each of the subsequent films. He couldn’t.
He fancied himself a Spielberg. He wasn’t.
The studios thought they’d make buckets of money using his name as a brand. They didn’t.
What I don't understand is the extreme hate. When his name comes up on a film, people boo. Or laugh. Or groan. Why is he box office poison any more than Kate Hudson or Jennifer Aniston or Kathryn Heigl, all of whom seem to keep finding work. I think every Adam Sandler film deserves the same reaction (except for the laughing part). Maybe that's the reason the only place Night's name shows up for his latest film, After Earth starring Will Smith and his son, is on the poster. (By the way, it's been getting eviscerated in the reviews, and has a bottom-dwelling 13% on Rotten Tomatoes).
At least he's consistent.
Not that he asked me, but if I were him I'd walk away from the genre for a while. I'd direct something totally out of character and unexpected. Perhaps a comedy, which he's shown some real flair for in portions of some of his films. And I'd give myself a cameo, because as director it's fun to do that. But I'd make it a real cameo - the kind Hitchcock gave himself, usually about two seconds of screen time.
There are already a million Sixth Sense jokes, and even a YouTube video, about the secret of Night's career being that it was already dead. There's also a book about how he crashed and burned.
I can't say I've enjoyed a film of his in a long time.
But I'm still hoping the story of his career has a surprise ending.
The first thing I have to say is I feel sorry for the dog.
If you can stomach watching the first installment of child-killer Casey Anthony's video diary, you'll be interested to know that she adopted a dog. She says she loves the dog as much as any family she's ever had. Which of course means we're only days away from finding out Rags is missing, only to be later discovered in a ditch with a band-aid on his forehead and duct tape around his snout.
Let's all take a moment to say a big goodbye to the dog.
She also mentions at one point that she doesn't like having her picture taken. I think it's good that she brought it up, because if you looked at these pictures of her partying while her daughter Caylee was missing, you might get the mistaken idea that she's just an attention-whore-party-girl.
Which she's not. She says as much in the video.
What she never mentions is Caylee, her murdered daughter. Probably best not to bring that up. It'll only remind people that, like OJ, despite all the evidence beating a path straight to her door, she was acquitted. Doesn't matter. There's not a person alive who doesn't know she did it.
I don't know what makes me hate her more (aside from the obvious): that she was out partying while law enforcement officials and concerned citizens were out combing every inch of the countryside around the clock for her missing daughter, or the fact she completely threw the only person who still liked her - her father - under the bus at trial.
If there's any silver lining here, it's that she's so universally hated I don't think she can even pull off a reality show at this point. Or at least a reality show that isn't produced by her for YouTube.
While Casey makes all of this about her, let's take a moment to remember the reason she's even a topic of discussion: her beautiful, too soon departed daughter Caylee. If there's a YouTube in heaven - and there should be or else it wouldn't be called heaven - I'm sure Caylee is watching the video and thinking three things:
1. I can't believe I drew the short straw and got her for a mother.
2. I think I'll stop watching YouTube.
3. At least I know I won't be running into her here.
