I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: RHEOSTATICS-Corel Centre, Ottawa, ON (November 29, 1996).

This is the 15th night of the 24 date Canadian Tour opening for The Tragically Hip on their Trouble At The Henhouse Tour.  The site has recently added a DAT version of the show in conjunction with the existing fan-recorded version.

It opens in a very amusing way.  I imagine that Dave and Martin are lying on the stage, because Dave asks, “Martin can you sleep?”
Martin: “No, I can’t sleep.  I’ve smoked about three cigarettes.”
Dave “I had this weird dream we were playing in a giant arena named after a software company, opening for Ringo’s All Stars.  It felt really weird.”
Tim starts playing the bass.
Daev: “Might as well just get up.”
Martin: “That’s either a nightmare or a fantastic dream.”
Then they loop saying “Let’s see what Tim and Don are up to.”

Dave breaks character and says, “The comedy is free tonight.”  Which leads to a rocking “Fat” followed by a nice surprise of “Aliens.”  Martin sings, “they came down in 1996.”

Then comes a grooving “Dope Fiends.”  I love that in these 1996 shows the middle part is a cool jam.  It makes the loud ending even more powerful.  And as the song fades it segues nicely into “Digital Beach.”  They start “Claire” before Martin is done and Martin sings a few more “beautiful things” before they start “Claire” properly.

Dave says that they are the Rheostatics from Etobicoke.  They’ve been around for 17 years and it’s a privilege to share the stage with The Hip and uh… we like you.  We have a new record out called The Blue Hysteria.  Sixteen songs, one of them is secret, so really only 15 and this next song is from that.”

Dave keeps talking about the record–it’s in quad sound while someone starts playing “Bad Time to Be Poor.”

Dave thanks the Green Sprouts who are here tonight–we have an address on the back of our CD and if you write us, we will write you back.  We promise.

Dave asks, Is anybody here form Italy tonight (massive cheers).
Martin: Oh my god, it must be empty over there.
This next song (a rocking “Motorino”)  is about being over there and wanting to be home.  It’s a great version that segues into a terrific “Feed Yourself.”  Boy I hope the next time I See them, they play “Feed Yourself.”

[READ: February 2019] Lawn Boy

Yup, I grabbed this book because of the Phish song/album.

Nope, it has nothing to do with the band at all.

Yup, I still enjoyed it quite a lot.

This is the story of Mike Muñoz.  He is basically stuck.  He absolutely loves landscaping–it is his passion.  He wants to sculpt topiary and be a recognized artist.  But he is stuck doing menial landscaping jobs–ones that often involves picking up dog poo more than beautifying plants.

Mike’s father abandoned him a long time ago, when Mike was 11.  When Mike was five, he took Mike to Disneyland.  Disneyland turned out to be an abandoned building site.  He told Mike “I guess they moved.”

There have been many stepfathers since then, but now his mom is pretty much done with all that. She works double shifts as a waitress in a bar (Mike tries to not go there).  Mike lives at home with her and his mentally handicapped brother.  He basically hasn’t matured past a child and has an impulse control and gets upset very easily.   He is also bigger than Mike–by a lot–so even though Mike does a good job watching him, its not easy.

Mike’s short term goal is to ask out Remy, a waitress in a restaurant that he and Nate go to quite a lot (because of her).  Mike thinks Remy is gorgeous and that she is way to good for him.  But there is hope…she does seem to respond to his foolish behavior.

The only person he can confide in is his best friend, Nick.  Nick is, frankly, an unpleasant jerk.  He is ragingly homophobic and so Mike likes to tease him about that–“you know tThe Rock is gay, right?”  “That’s the stupidest shit I’ve ever heard.”  Mike has been friends with him and his family since they were little.  In fact, Nick often slept over when Nick’s father was in a bad way.

So Mike is basically a loser.  He has no job (but he does have his own lawnmower) , he has no (good) friends, and he pines for a woman.  Although he does point out that he’s not a virgin–he had a pity quickie with a senior when he was in high school.

As the story opens, Mike basically quit his job because he was sick of picking up dog poo.  So now he’s got nothing.  His truck is about to die (and does soon), so he can’t contribute to the family money.  How is he ever going to ask out a woman if he can’t even afford minutes for his cellphone.

The only new income comes from Freddy, an unemployed guy who spends most of his day making up his own bass lines to existing pornos.  He also seems to be incapable of buying underwear that holds everything in.  Freddy lives in the family tool shed.  So Mike offers him the house (since Freddy spends most of his time in the house anyway), while Mike moves to the shed.  It’s a few extra dollars for the family.

There’s a scene later in the story where Mike does some of his own dental work which is alternately horrifying and hilarious.

Then real possibility shows up in the form of Chaz Linford, an alcoholic capitalist who dreams big no matter how legal his ideas are.  Chaz’s latest idea is Chaz Unlimited Limited a questionable business that Mike applies to join.  Chaz (who drives a super fancy car) is willing to pay him like $20 an hour because Mike is a “motivated candidate” (meaning he applied for the job).  The job sucks (assembling promotional bobbleheads and crap) but at least he has a window.  Unlike the other two guys in the warehouse.

This job also gets him out into corporate America, because every day he has lunch in a quad with guys with beards and skinny jeans.  He thinks that maybe they can be friends, they’re certainly friendly.  Although they like his T-shirt because “dive bars are cool” (it’s a shirt for where his mom works).

But whatever, the money is rolling in and he can finally ask out Remy.

In addition to above homophobia, this story touches on racism (Mike is “Californian, not Mexican,” he explains).  In addition to that, there’s a frightening/hilarious sequence where Mike is driving with Freddy and Nate and they get pulled over and race comes into play in a big way.

The homophobia angle is a little weird (well, not really, but it was unexpected) until Mike reveals an incident that happened in fourth grade.  It happened with Doug Goble, the real estate mogul.  They each put his penis in the other kid’s mouth.  When Mike reveals this to Nick, Nick totally freaks out.  Mike tries to explain to him that Nick hates gays (and so many other people) because he is scared.  Nick storms off, maybe for good?

Although there are some horrible people in the story, they all have relevance to the story and quite often they come in as comic relief (because Mike is sarcastic and has been through too much not to laugh).  But Mike is also not a saint and he often does things that are very frustrating (making him all the more believable).

The thing with Goble comes to the fore later in the story when Goble tries to hire Mike to do landscaping work for him–he believes that Mike is really good at what he does.  Mike is still angry and confused about what happened, but Doug seems oblivious to it.  He really wants Mike on Team Goble, and he has the cash to pay him well.  (And the business is legal, too).

At this point, Mike doesn’t know what to do–what job to take.

He finds a new friend in a local librarian Andrew.  Mike has always been an avid reader (lots of books are name-checked throughout the novel).  And Andrew offers some recommendations.  Later on, Mike sees Andrew protesting puppy mills (it’s a rather ineffectual protest, but still), and he winds up joining in.  Even if protesting doesn’t pay, it’s nice to do something you believe in.

Inspired by some encouraging words from Andrew, Mike decides to take a join with Goble–it pays quite well.  And he’s getting his name out there as a quality worker.  So much so that he is offered more money to work privately for someone else.  What should Mike do?

The real question is can Mike (and his friends and family) accept him for who he is (which his family has been doing all along, really) and can he see that his vision is valuable too.

I really enjoyed this book, it was a fun fast read and the ending went in a direction I totally wasn’t expecting but which had a very satisfying payoff.