Saturday, October 30, 2010

Go Gay Hippies!


This guy got on my bus 15 years ago who turned out to be this guy I hadn't seen in 20 years. In the meantime he had acquired a soon to be ex wife and a sweet terribly serious little boy. We made friends again and the little boy grew up. Along the way, the kid developed a taste for alcohol and weed and pain pills and lies. He ended up pissing everybody off so bad that he checked into rehab at the strong suggestion of his entire family. He finally decided that maybe that wasn't such a bad idea and he's been sober for almost a year and a half. Somewhere in there he picked up a guitar and became a pretty good player. He gets a big kick out of the fact that his dad's old friend is sober and we hang out together on our own now. He's been saying we should get together and learn a song sometime and today was the day and this was the song.

It was funny for me because he can play all kind of weird jazz chords and he knows all of this music theory and he can improvise in keys that only dogs can hear but he did not know how to play a country and western waltz. I got to get him up to speed on 3/4 time and led him through the chord changes chanting 1-2-3/ 1-2-3.

He suggested that maybe it would be cool to try playing the song to some kind of speeded up ska beat. He thought that would make the song sound funny and not so serious. I had to explain to him that the song is already funny. Apparently he hadn't considered that possibility. I sang it to him in my best super sincere country western voice and he had to admit that maybe it was a funny song after all. He played me a really funny song he wrote about having sex with farm animals.

The hardest part of "Pardon Me" is the spoken word part. You have to sound like you are just talking casually but pace yourself so you say the last word just as the guitar plays a G chord. We just barely got that going when it was time to leave.

I dropped him back at his house just before the Giants game started. He said, "I really wanna see the San Francisco Gay Hippies beat the Texas Oil Assholes." It didn't happen tonight but it's nice to know that every Giants victory is a victory for gay hippies everywhere. I keep thinking that it's my imagination that the World Series is about politics but the TV kept showing that notorious asshole and murderer George Bush. I was watching the game in a taqueria for a while. Somebody said "Bush really looks like shit." Somebody else said, "Good". To me he looked pretty hung over.

I had a pretty good day. Go Gay Hippies!

5 comments:

Tim said...

Well, what can you say about a piece of art like this story Jon here is relating. It's the second thing I read today and I'm glad it got in that quick, as it may set the tone.

ib said...

Well. Some time in the course of my stumbling into offline purgatory for the better part of a month and more, I appear to have missed the opportunity to wish you many happy returns.

Pardon me. I am not terribly good on remembering dates at the best of times, but at least I have a cast iron alibi on this occasion.

Cool to read about your jamming on the uke and guitar. And cooler still to read that the chord was sustained.

The paint brush has not made it into the kitchen yet, but there is a cup of tea on the counter with your name on it.

Mr. Beer N. Hockey said...

I get the feeling there may be a few too many people down there, way down there, who have been praying for victories from both the Rangers and the Republicans. Looks like they have to settle for a Meatloaf special: one out of two ain't bad.

Hagar's Daughter said...

Glad you're still blogging. I'm starting back at the same old place, but now I'll talk about my battle with breast cancer.

Just dropped by to say hi.

Your driver said...

HD. I'm glad you're back but I was worried you were having health problems. I'm glad you're with us. I look forward to reading what you have to say. Thanks for getting in touch.

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