MK rocks the Palace

Diane and I had the great fortune of catching the legendary Mark Knopfler at the Palace on Sunday, May 9th. For those of you who don't know who this living god is, first of all, shame on you and I don't even know you anymore. He was the lead singer and co-founder of Dire Straits, which rocked the world a generation before I was ready to appreciate music.

Since the end of the Dire Straits days sometime in the 1990's, Mark Knopfler has been fairly steadily putting out solo albums. To be honest, the pieces he played from his solo albums were as impressive and enjoyable as the Dire Straits classics he played.

Here is the setlist:

Bordre Reiver

What It Is

Sailing to Philadelphia

Prairie Wedding

Hill Farmer's Blues

Romeo and Juliet

Sultans of Swing

Donegan's Gone

Get Lucky

Marbletown (band introduction)

Speedway at Nazareth

Telegraph Road (part I & part II)

Encore:

Brothers in Arms

So Far Away

Piper to the End

I could not believe we were treated to Sultans of Swings AND Telegraph Road, which to me is the Mark Knopfler anthem. I have never been as familiar with most of his solo material. Don't get me wrong - I have all the albums, it's just harder to recognize the songs. But, I have to admit that even among that incredibly generous Dire Straits serving in the setlist, in my opinion, the band was at their best on Speedway at Nazareth. If you know these songs at all, that alone tells you how impressive that rendition was. It's hard to imagine Speedway at Nazareth upstaging Telegraph Road. Seriously, watch the link above.

This was my second time watching MK live. The first was on the eve of junior prom in high school. My stepdad had gotten me tickets for Christmas or a birthday or something and we went to watch the Sailing to Philadelphia tour at Red Rocks in Denver. Even after all those years, MK was still filthy on the guitar. And I am not just saying that out of blind infatuation - the TU reviewer agreed.

Technically speaking, I have never seen DS, but it turns out that MK is touring with Danny Cummings on the drums (who was an old DS percussionist) and Guy Fletcher on piano/accoustic guitar/electric guitar/percussion...vocals...everything (who was a DS ... everything). Essentially, it could be argued that we were a John Illsley short of an actual DS reunion.

One of the first things Diane and I noticed when we were walking to the Palace was that we were about 30 years younger than everybody else in the building. In fact, when we were walking out, there was a couple behind us discussing this same phenomenon and the wife said, "Where are all the young people? There aren't any young people here." We summarily turned around and remarked that we consider ourselves fairly young and a good laugh was had by all.

So now, of course, I am on an MK and DS stretch where that's all I can listen to. This morning I added Telegraph Road to my Ipod before my run. The great thing about that is that the song is 14 minutes long, so by the time I had finished listening to it, my run was halfway done. Thanks for that MK.

It's official - I'm a New Yorker (Updated)

There it is - all over my car:

I can't wait to drive back to Colorado with my fancy New York elitist liberal license plates. I can already picture all the nice simple country folk out yonder sneering at my East Coast creds. And all I am going to do while I am there is blast that New York song by Rihanna and the other guy.

UPDATE: Apparently it was Alicia Keys that sings that song. Whatever.

I have now traded my Colorado license plate - which looks like a diet Mountain Dew can to me - for a generic New York plate, with no distinguishing factors that I can identify. Doesn't matter though, baby, the only thing that matters on this plate is the name, homey.

New ride

I have a big problem with impulse buys.

In the summer of 2007, I was working at Camp Taconic, where the day starts with "Sing" - where the whole camp comes together after clean-up to sing some songs before morning announcements. There is nothing like an auditorium full of singing kids to get your day going. But to be honest, I did enjoy Sing most of the time. I mostly hated it when I was hungover.

I was quite obsessed with the guitar playing that I saw during Sing - especially during Rocky Top. And one day I snuck into town to buy a guitar --- on impulse.

Three years later and I can play some simple Neil Young songs, maybe a Cat Stevens tune or two...and that's about it. I just had to learn the hard (and expensive way) that my family genes have no regard for music. There is no ritmo running through my veins.

Last weekend, I made a similar impulse buy. Turns out that a skateboard shop opened on the corner of Lark and State. When I was walking in the park with Diane, this new shop came up in conversation, mostly because it was just nice to have a new business in that storefront. Well, needless to say, about 30 minutes later I owned a skateboard.

This skateboard.

I chose this skateboard because I am a Democrat.

Anyways, I have diligently practiced and I have become quite the avid skater. I even skateboarded to work the day after buying this amazing device.

Maybe this is my mid-life crisis.

Value your opposable thumb (GRAPHIC)

NOTE: There is a graphic photo of my thumb below. Read at your own risk.

Last night, I was chopping up a $4 head of lettuce that Diane and I had bought at the food co-op when in the rush to eat this very valuable vegetable, I managed to slice into the tip of my left thumb. I knew immediately that it was not good. I mean, I also knew that I wasn't going to lose the finger, but I also knew there was no way I could take care of this situation myself.

So I called out to Diane, "ADB, I need you to drive me to the hospital, please." We wrapped my thumb in an old t-shirt and drove off. Luckily, Albany Med is very close.

We got to the ER and after the thumb got looked at, the doctor told me I would need stitches. And a tetanus shot. Great. I have never gotten stitches. In fact, this is probably the most serious injury I have had - if you don't count the time my foot got stuck in the elevator, which is a story I'll leave for another day.

Anyhow, Diane and I hung out in the ER waiting for the tip of my finger to be sown back with the rest of it. After only an hour or so, the doctor started working on it. He put in some local anesthesia, which, of course, did not take on the tip of the finger where I really needed it.

Eventually, the sowing got done. I commented to Diane how this was crafting in a way and if she paid close attention, she could take care of this next time it happens. She did not really appreciate that observation.

The doctor did a pretty good job, as you can see.

I have had the better part of a day to get used to this, and although having had this happen to my right hand - since I am right-handed - would have been really tough, it nonetheless has taken some effort adjust to daily activities without an opposable digit on my left hand.

For starters, making a salad after this incident last night was really hard. And dealing with contacts is just not going to be easy. Shoe-tying. Typing this has been a bitch.

Editing problem in new Southwest Airlines commercial

I admit that this is a very picky post. However, I have been known to be a stickler for details, and if you don't believe me, ask Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and her mystery plane controversy which I first reported on the hallowed pages of this blog.

The other night while I was watching the new Southwest Airlines commercial that shows the ground crew running over to an airplane of another company and baring their hairy chests which spell "Bags Fly Free," I happened to notice that somebody royally screwed the ad up.

Here's a link to the ad, which notwithstanding the editing problem, is actually one of my favorites. Diane's mother happens to find the "Y" very funny.

Did you notice anything?

Well, look again closely and this time pay attention at the :14 second mark. You can see the plane clearly in that shot and you can see that it has twin engines mounted at the rear of the fuselage. I presume this is an MD80, as seen directly below.
Now, pay close attention at the :21 second mark. At this point, we are shown the perspective of a passenger in the above-referenced plane looking out the window at the crazy ground crew. Notice, however, that in this shot, you can make out the wing of the plane, and - and this is the key point - an engine mounted on such wing!!!This means that we are dealing with two different planes, folks. The only explanation that I can think of for this is that Southwest's fleet is composed exclusively of Boeing 737s. The competitor's plane is clearly not a Boeing 737 - you know, with the rear-mounted engines and all. I assume that since Southwest wanted to use their own aircraft for the interior shot, they had to use a Boeing 737.

My question: why not use an interior shot that doesn't include the wing?

New traffic at Albany

So there I was entertaining guests at my home on Saturday evening when I look out the window and see a giant plane heading into Albany International's Runway 1. I jumped up and shouted, "What the hell is that?"

After looking at the unusual beast in the air through the binoculars, I identified it as a Boeing 747. What was a Jumbo Jet doing in Albany, I wondered. So I went to Flight Aware to check out Albany's traffic and spotted a whole host of visitors we usually don't get the pleasure of seeing, including many 757's from the West Coast.

The Flight Aware maps of these flights showed that they had all done some circling in the NYC metro area before diverting this way, so I suspected that their visits to Albany were weather related. This assumption was later confirmed by the TU, which identified the B747 as a cargo plane from Brussels.

Piss-poor idea

ANA, Japan's second largest airline, will be introducing women-only lavatory facilities on flights. This does not seem like a good idea on several fronts. My first thought, from my very limited experience in observing female bathroom lines, they tend to be five times longer.
The article also cites that at least part of the reason for this change was due to a customer survey in which a large percentage of women passengers thought this would be a good idea. Hmmm - they must have been shocked to hear that. Among the reasons the women cited for the women-only lavatory was that men leave the toilet seat up. Are any of these women married? If so, do they have separate facilities in their own home? Now, the only thing I really know about Japan is that there is no space on the island-nation, hence multiple-level driving ranges, and the whole sleeping in a drawer bit. So I presume that most dwellings do not use precious, precious space on multiple and unnecessary bathrooms.

And finally, I could totally picture the situation where there would be a boy passenger who really has to go, but is forced to wait in line while a perfectly useful airplane lavatory is waiting unoccupied. Now, the airline did say they would waive the rule in cases of "emergencies" and when "few women are on-board." But I'm thinking, isn't every time you have to go an "emergency"?