AC/DC - 4/9/01 in St. Paul...and Jail in Minneapolis

With the announcement of a new AC/DC album and hopefully tour, I got to thinking about the last time I saw AC/DC.  In early February of 2001 due to my own stupidity I got arrested for DWI.  I quickly retained a well-known shifty lawyer named Jerry Krauss to handle my case, but the whole process was a monumental pain in the ass.  I eventually got it reduced to a reckless driving ticket, but the following illustrates one of the millions of reasons why drinking and driving should never be an option for you.  One of the many things that had to happen to get it all behind me was that I had to officially turn myself into the Hennepin County Jail and spend a night.  My lawyer and I set the date for Monday, April 9th, 2001. 

A few weeks before this dreaded day I was in the car with my girlfriend at the time Karen.  We were listening to 92 KQRS on the radio when they announced that they were giving away a pair of AC/DC tickets to the 20^th caller.  AC/DC is one of my all-time favorite bands so I called in and lo and behold I won!  I had been feeling sick about the whole arrest thing which was constantly weighing heavily on my mind, so when I was told that I had won I said live on the radio:  “Holy sh*t!  You have no idea how much I needed some good news right now!  Thank you!”

 

I was ecstatic until I realized that the concert was on the same night I had to turn myself into lockup for the night.  Dammit!  It might still work though.  My lawyer said that in order to minimize the actual time spent in the horrible place, you just have to present yourself anytime before midnight.  I could show up at 11:59 pm and still get credit for having been there on that day.  The concert was in downtown St. Paul and the jail was in downtown Minneapolis.  It would be close, but I decided I could make it.  I quickly called my best friend Mitch Marshall and he was in.  We had great seats to see one of our favorite bands on the night I had to go to jail.

 

Now we just had to figure out the logistics.  We set the time limit for me to be out of the concert by 11 pm.  That should give me enough time to get from St. Paul to Minneapolis and all checked into jail by midnight.  Our buddy Al Sedaka lives in St. Paul so we enlisted his help.  Mitch would pick me up at my condo in Plymouth and drive us to the concert.  At 11 pm, no matter where AC/DC was in their concert I would leave the show and meet Al out front on the curb.  He would then drive me to jail.  Theoretically I would check in, go to sleep, get up in the morning, go to court with my lawyer, post bail, then leave.  Our buddy Arnie Hagen would then pick me up and bring me home.  If it was early enough I would then go into work on that Tuesday morning.  I would be tired, but happy to be out of jail.  I told my boss I would probably be late and she was fine with that.

 

So Mitch picked me up on the evening of 4/9/01 and we got to the concert in plenty of time for the 8 pm start.  Our tickets were awesome…about 10^th row on the floor, a couple of seats in from the center walkway that the singer Brian Johnson and the guitarist Angus Young would use to run up and down on throughout the concert.  Yes!  The concert blew us away of course…it’s f*cking AC/DC!  In the words of Eddie Van Halen from the first time he saw them back in the 70’s when Van Halen opened up for AC/DC:  “They really only play one song, but it’s a great song.”  Brian’s voice sounded perfect, even on the old Bon Scott songs, and all night schoolboy-Angus ran all over the stage as well as up and down the walkway just a few feet from us.

 

While it was a great concert, I had this whole f*cking JAIL thing hanging over my head all night.  I had no idea what it was going to be like, but I knew it was not going to be pleasant.  I kept checking the time, hoping the concert would end before 11 pm.  Finally the main part of the show ended…time for the encore.  It was 10:45 pm…going to be close.  They broke into ‘T.N.T’, but I had to be outside to meet Al by 11 pm.  For almost every AC/DC concert since the early 80’s, the final song is always ‘For Those About To Rock, We Salute You’.  When they started that next I knew the concert was ending and it was time for me to leave.  I solemnly said goodbye to Mitch and made my way off the floor up to the first level.  I slowly backed up the stairs while watching the song come to a close.  If you know the song you know it ends with a bunch of cannons going off.  “For those about to rock…FIRE! (cannons go off) We salute you!”  And if you have ever seen it in concert you know that a row of cannons appear onstage and they fire off…on cue at first with every yell of: “Fire!”, and then they just go off like crazy one after another to end the concert.  It seemed fitting that my last view of the stage was the cannons being wheeled out onto stage, and the last sounds I heard as I made my way to the exit were the cannons firing while Brian was screaming:  “Fire!  Fire!  Fire!..."  It was almost as if they were saying:  “For those about to go to jail, we salute you!”

 

With Angus’s blistering solos and the cannons still ringing in my ears, I got into the front seat of Al’s car and began the half hour drive to an uncertain fate.  I was a little worried that I had beer on my breathe, but I was sure that the one beer I had many hours ago at the beginning of the concert would not register if they decided to breathalyzer me.  I knocked on the door, they let me in and took all my name and information and then led me to a large gross room full of f*cked-up degenerates.  This is not where I was spending the night was it?!  I took one look in this hell-hole and the guard assured me it is just a holding cell to keep me until they can process me in for the night.  He motioned me inside and then closed the big metal door shut behind me.  Dread.  Horror.  I had just turned 35 a week ago.  Was this really where I was supposed to be in my life?!  I looked around hoping there was a nice quiet corner for me hide in until the guard came back for me.  There was not.  Everyone stared at the new guy and my heart sank as I looked around at the 30 foot by 10 foot main room, with another smaller 8 by 10 foot room attached that served as the bathroom.

 

The main room had a bench that ran the length of one side, but it was covered with drunks, dealers, gangbangers and shady looking characters who looked like they would just as soon shoot me than move over and let me sit down.  Not only was there not really anywhere to sit, but there was hardly any room to stand.  There must have been 50 people crowded into that dirty brick room with grime and snot and what looked like blood and sh*t on the walls.  “Excuse me…excuse me…” I whispered as I made my way through the late-night wretches to the back of the room.  I had to step around one young guy who was rolling around on the floor yelping complete gibberish.  When I got to the other side near the entrance to the ‘bathroom’, I stopped for a bit and looked back at the floor-guy, trying to figure out what his deal was.  A guy next to me noticed my fearful, inquisitive face and he mumbled:  “Don’t worry about him…he’s just tripping on acid.”  I nodded in agreement that he was on something, but I doubted very much that it was acid.  I watched for awhile, but I needed something to lean on.  I couldn’t just stand there for who-knows how long.

 

I was near the opening to the bathroom area.  It was really just a smaller version of the main room, but it instead of a bench on one side it had one urinal and a toilet sticking out of the wall.  No walls, no privacy, just a small open room filled with people as well…the overflow from the main room.  I peered in and noted there was a place to stand by the urinal which was right by the bathroom entrance…near the space between the two rooms.  I made my way over to it and put my right arm on the top of the urinal.  At last, something to lean on.  No place to sit (unless I wanted to join the drugged out guy on the floor or sit on the disgusting toilet) but at least I had my own space to lean.  I decided I would just hang out there, keep my head down and wait for them to call my name.

 

Suddenly I heard a slow, deliberate, menacing voice.  It seemed to be aimed at me.  I looked up and there were three black dudes about 10 feet away staring at me.  One of them slowly repeated:  “I said mother*cker, are you throwing some signs at us?”  My eyes opened wide with shock and fear.  Signs?  What the hell is a sign??  It was then I happened to notice my right hand.  With my right arm resting on the top of the urinal my right hand was just dangling in space.  Were my fingers dangling in such a way that they looked like a sign?  Gang signs or something?  I then remembered a show I had half-watched on cable TV about gangs and how they communicated or identified themselves with signs.  Oh sh*t…was I unwittingly ‘signing’?  Was I telling these guys to f*ck off in sign language or telling them that I was in a rival gang?!  I quickly put my hand down to my side and said the first thing that popped into my head:  “No…no!  I don’t know any signs.  Uh…I know some cool websites though!”  They all stared at me, trying to figure out what my game was.  I had no game.  I was just some stupid white boy stammering hopefully about websites.  After about 20 seconds of silence I think they decided that I was a weirdo and they left me alone.  Phew.

 

After about 15 minutes of standing there I got the courage to put my arm back up on the urinal, this time with my hand in a loose fist…NOT in any way shape or form what I thought might look like a sign.  Guys came and guys left the holding cell, and I just stood there waiting my turn.  Finally after about an hour I heard my name called.  Thank god I whispered.  They took me and three other guys to the booking area where they strip-searched us, exchanged our clothes for orange jail jumpsuits, took our pictures and fingerprinted us.  It was not fun, but at least I was out of the hell-room.  This was progress!  I hoped I would get my own jail cell, catch a few hours of sleep and be on my way in the morning.  The other guys looked nervous and made weak jokes, but they seemed like they had been there before.  One of them was worried about his diabetes medication.  After getting booked they handed us each a pillow and a blanket and led us through a series of hallways until we reached a large dorm room.  Oh no…I was not getting my own cell.  I was going to sleep with about 100 other guys in a big room filled with rows of bunk beds and one toilet sitting at the end of the room.  This toilet was behind a 3-foot wall, so you had the tiniest bit of privacy, but everyone could still see your head.  Thank god I didn’t have to poop.  Now that I think about it, I don’t think I even peed in there.

 

I managed to get a bottom bunk, laid down and pretended to sleep.  It was noisy with guys talking and yelling and rapping all night so there would be no sleep.  Eventually the sun came up and began to shine through the barred windows.  Finally.  Jail is really nothing more than a lot of waiting.  Trying not to get in anyone’s way or be noticed by anyone...and waiting.  Eventually they called my name.  Time for court.  Wearing my orange jumpsuit I already felt ‘guilty’, but to my relief they let me change back into my street clothes on the way to the courtroom.  Cool.  I almost felt like a real person again.  I got in the courtroom and looked around for Jerry.  Not there.  Instead I heard a female call out my name as she walked towards me.  It was Jerry’s assistant, Rachael Goldbloom.  I was a little nervous about that but she said this was no big deal, just a formality and Jerry did not need to be here.  The judge would set the real court date in the future, the bail bondsman that Jerry had sent over would post my bail, and I would be out of there in a little bit.

 

The judge did indeed set a future court date and Rachael left, telling me my bail would be posted shortly.  It wasn’t going to be right away?  Really??  Crap.  They led me back to the booking area, took my clothes away and gave me another orange jumpsuit and took me back to the dorm room.  Was all this really necessary?  I was going to be out in a few minutes.  I started to panic but trusted that it would go down just like Rachael said.  I waited an hour…two hours…three hours.  What the hell was taking so long?!  I finally managed to talk the guard into letting me go make a phone call.  I called Jerry’s office and Rachael answered.  She asked why I was still in jail and I yelled that I was wondering the same thing!  She said to sit tight…she put me on hold…she came back and told me that the bail bondsman had come to the jail that morning but was told that I had already been let out so he left.  No!!  Well get him back I shouted!  She said he was extremely busy but he would try and get back there later that day.  No!  He must come now!  I was really starting to freak out but she said she would get me out as soon as possible.

 

I went to lunch…still nothing.  Back to the room...nothing.  I made small talk with a guy in the next bunk.  We talked for awhile but then he got bailed out and left.  Did they forget about me??  What if I had to stay in there forever?  I was allowed to use the phone again.  I called my boss to let her know I was not going to be in that day.  I called Rachael.  She was not there.  Then it was time for dinner.  I was so sick from worry I could not eat.  My mind raced.  Should I try and escape?  Maybe through a ventilation shaft like in the movies?  They would probably never miss me since I had apparently been forgotten.  Then I thought of the AC/DC song ‘Jailbreak’.  That guy made it out…with a bullet in his back.  I’ll just stay put.  After a couple more hours they moved me to a smaller room with only about 20 guys in it.  Lights out in an hour at 10 pm.  What the f*ck?  Was I going to have to spend another night in here?  I made my bed and laid down as they were making final rounds while turning off the lights.  I wanted to cry.  This was wrong.  Suddenly I heard my name called.  I thought I was dreaming.  I ran to the door tripping over my feet.  What??  I was being bailed out the guard said!  I was trembling with relief.  I could not get out of there fast enough.

 

I got my clothes back and I was never so happy to put on an old set of dirty clothes.  I called Arnie and told him I was finally able to leave.  He came and picked me up on the street corner outside of jail and within 20 minutes I was walking down the hallway to the door of my condo.   It was 24 hours after the AC/DC concert had ended and it had been the longest day of my life.  I was dead tired and immediately fell asleep, happy that another big step in getting through the ordeal was over.  I have not seen AC/DC since then, but I plan on seeing them when they come through on the next tour for their upcoming album - 'Rock Or Bust'.  I am sure it will be a great show and I hope Mitch comes with, but it will never match the surreal feeling I had seeing them in 2001 knowing the concert was only the beginning of my night.  Again…do not drink and drive.

 

AC/DC setlist – 4/9/01
Xcel Center – St. Paul, MN

1. You Shook Me All Night Long
2. Stiff Upper Lip
3. Shot Down In Flames
4. Thunderstruck
5. Hell Ain't A Bad Place To Be
6. Hard As A Rock
7. Shoot To Thrill
8. Rock And Roll Ain't Noise Pollution
9. Safe In New York City
10. Bad Boy Boogie
11. Hells Bells
12. Get It Hot
13. The Jack
14. Back In Black
15. Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap
16. Highway To Hell
17. Whole Lotta Rosie
18. Let There Be Rock

Encore:

19. T.N.T.
20. For Those About To Rock (We Salute You)

 AC/DC – ‘Jailbreak’

There was a friend of mine on murder
And the judge's gavel fell
Jury found him guilty
Gave him sixteen years in hell
He said “I ain't spending my life here
I ain't living alone
Ain't breaking no rocks on the chain gang
I'm breakin' out and headin' home”

Gonna make a jailbreak
And I'm lookin' towards the sky
I'm gonna make a jailbreak
Oh, how I wish that I could fly

All in the name of liberty
All in the name of liberty
Got to be free

Jailbreak, let me out of here
Jailbreak, sixteen years
Jailbreak, had more than I can take
Jailbreak, yeah

He said he'd seen his lady being fooled with
By another man
She was down and he was up
He had a gun in his hand
Bullets started flying everywhere
And people started to scream
Big man lying on the ground
With a hole in his body
Where his life had been
But it was -
All in the name of liberty
All in the name of liberty
I got to be free

Jailbreak, jailbreak
I got to break out
Out of here

Heartbeats, they were racin'
Freedom, he was chasin'
Spotlights, sirens, rifles firing
But he made it out…
With a bullet in his back

The Universal Hot vs. Crazy Matrix - A Man's Guide To Women

Well the busy summer is just about over so it is time to check in again.  I recently saw this video on youtube, and although some might find offensive I think it is pretty damn funny and not entirely inaccurate.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vwbKYcBdVyk

(If this link does not work, just go to youtube.com and enter 'Universal Hot Crazy Matrix' into the search and choose the one that is 5:08 long.  You should watch this before you read any further.)

And while at first I thought it was just a hilarious bit, I began to wonder how accurate the chart it.  As the guy says this is not a static environment...women can jump from point to point on the chart on a moment's notice, so to get an accurate reading you have to obtain a cluster of data points and take the average.  So I devised a series of five questions with situations that a woman might find herself in along with four possible answers to each question.  We already know how hot a woman is in our mind on the typical 1-10 scale, so these questions are devised to determine the other axis...the 'Crazy' scale which runs from 4-10 because as the guy said, they are all at least a 4.  I had my wife take the test.  I already know that in my mind she is an 8 hot (9's are models and the only 10's are a few of the Victoria Secret girls).  After evaluating her answers on the test below, she came up with a stunning 4.8 on the crazy scale.  I scored a unicorn!  The four possible answers for each question are lettered 'A' through 'D', but keep in mind her answer can fall in between an A and a B, sort of like a B+ or A-.  Have your wife/girlfriend take the test and see how she sizes up using my 5 research questions:


1)  The first question deals with ‘Jealousy’.  I will provide you with a scenario.  Read all four answers provided and choose the answer accordingly which most closely describes you.  You can also say you are between answers…like ‘between B and C’.

You are walking in the mall with your dude.  Suddenly you hear an excited female voice call out your dude’s name and she comes running over with a big gooey smile on her face.  She is hot.  She is your dude’s ex and she is ignoring you and gushing on with your dude about how it is so great to see him.  Do you:

A)   Smile, reach out your hand and introduce yourself, and then excuse yourself saying you are going to step into the nearby Victoria Secret to do some shopping and let the two of them catch up for a couple minutes, completely secure in the knowledge that he is with YOU now and you have nothing to be jealous about because you would not be with him if you did not trust him.

 

B)   Stand there staring at your dude, waiting for him to recover from the awkwardness of the situation and introduce you to her, then politely listen to her mindless drivel until she gets the hint and moves on.  After she is gone you let it go, knowing that of course he isn’t a virgin and that past girlfriends are bound to pop up now and then.

 

C)   Stand there glaring at the two of them, tapping your toes impatiently, until you finally can’t take it anymore and grab his arm and lead him away from her.  You then spend the next 10 minutes grilling him on who that chick was, and how many more of his past wh*res you are going to have to be subjected to.

 

D)  You punch her in the face, and then him in the face…twice. 

2)  This next question has to do with the concept of levels of ‘Rage’.  Again I will give you a situation and the 4 possible outcomes.  Review carefully and give your answer to the best of your knowledge.

It is a late Saturday afternoon and you just got home from spending a ridiculous amount of money to get your hair/nails/eyebrows/whatever done.  You walk into the living room where your dude is watching NASCAR.  You stand there clearing your throat, waiting for him to notice you.  He doesn’t.  So you say:  “Hi honey, how’s the race going?”  He slowly turns his head to you.  With glazed eyes from 4 ½ hours of NASCAR he says:  “Huh?” and then turns back to the TV.  You:

A)   You remember that men do not care how big your eyebrows are, how you style your hair or what color your nails are painted.  You understand that unless the body part that you had worked on was your boobs, men do not have any interest.  You realize that we love you for you, not for your waxed eyebrows.  So you leave and go paint your toenails.

 

B)   You say:  “Hey!  How do you like my hair?”  Without looking he says:  “You look great honey!”  You mutter:  “Assh*le” under your breath and leave the room.  You then go paint your toenails and your daughter’s toenails.

 

C)   You march in front of the TV so he has to look at you.  When he tries to see around you, you grab the remote, shut off the TV and then throw the remote at him.  He ducks, says:  “WTF?” and you yell at him for 10 minutes about being an insensitive dick.  You run out of the room crying, and then go paint your toenails, your daughter’s toenails, and your son’s toenails.

 

D)  You punch him in the face, twice.  Then while he’s unconscious you paint his toenails.

 

3)  This next question has to do with the concept of ‘time’.  Again I will give you a situation and the 4 possible answers.  Review carefully and give your answer to the best of your knowledge.

It is 7:00 pm.  You are at your house getting ready for a night out with your dude.  The big concert you are seeing at the Xcel Center in St. Paul starts at 7:30 pm.  There is an opening band that he really wants to see, but you do not care about them in the least…in fact you dislike them.  They will play for one hour, from 7:30 pm to 8:30pm.  You are a 30 minutes drive from the arena so every minute you take from here on out is one less minute he gets to see of the opening band.  He has been ready for an hour and is patiently standing by the door, but periodically glancing at his watch and getting more antsy as time moves on.  You on the other hand have just gotten out of the shower.  You plug in your hair dryer and sparks fly out of it rendering it useless.  So you:

A)   Look at the clock and realize that you are going to be late and feel bad about it.  Even though you do not care for the opening band, you know that your dude likes them a lot so you decide that your hair does not matter in this situation.  You realize that he knows what you look like and knows how pretty you are with or without your hair blown or piles of make-up on.  So you quickly run a brush through your hair, throw on your clothes and rush out the door with him at 7:10 pm so he will get to see 50 minutes of the opener.

 

B)   You realize that time is running short, but you still want to look good.  Not taking into account that you are a half-hour drive away you think you have plenty of time to make the opener.  You forget about blow-drying your hair, but you take time to get your make-up on just right and pick out the right clothes and shoes.  You are ready at 7:30 pm, meaning he only gets to see the second half of the opener.

 

C)   You have no idea what time it is and you cannot understand why your dude is just standing by the door.  When the hair dryer fries you get pissed and demand he go to the neighbor’s house and borrow their dryer.  While he is gone, instead of getting dressed or do anything to facilitate you getting out of the door faster, you mix yourself a drink.  When he gets back with a dryer you take your usual sweet time and are finally ready at 8:00 pm, meaning your dude will completely miss the opening band.

 

D)  As always you have no idea what time it is and you do not care.  And why is your dude is just standing by the door?  Moron.  When the hair dryer blows you get pissed and demand he go to the store and buy you a new dryer.  While he is gone, instead of getting dressed or do anything to facilitate you getting out of the door faster, you mix yourself a drink…and then another…and then another.  By the time he gets back you are pretty drunk and do not care about the concert or getting there on time.  Having given up on seeing the opening band, he tries to rush you along so you won’t miss too much of the main act.  This really pisses you off so you get in a big fight and rip up the tickets and throw them in his face, thus ending the ‘night-out’.

 

4)  This next question has to do with drinking.  There are a million scenarios we could have used for this one, but I picked one that I am sure we are all familiar with.  Again I will give you the situation and the 4 possible answers.  Review carefully and give your answer to the best of your knowledge.

It is 7:30 pm on a Friday evening.  You have been at the bar with co-workers for happy-hour since 5:00 pm.  It is a festive crew and everyone is whooping it up, buying rounds of beer, doing shots, and getting drunker by the minute.  The people at the table next to you are even more loud, obnoxious and spilling beer all over the place.  Your boss is there.  A cute co-worker from the other side of the building has been eyeing you all night.  You are supposed to be on a late 9:00 pm date with a new guy you just met.  Your car is in the lot but you would probably blow over the .08 BAL legal limit if tested.  You:

A)   You have been drinking a glass of water between every beer/shot to keep you from drinking even more than you have been, and to eliminate any possibility of a hangover tomorrow.  You are a happy drunk instead of an angry drunk so after telling the loud people next to you a funny joke you politely ask them to move to the empty table over in the corner.  All evening you have been humorous, entertaining, telling good stories, listening attentively when others are telling stories, and buying your share of rounds…all of which impresses your boss.  You have been lightly flirting with the cute co-worker, and you invite him to join your fantasy football league so that you can get his phone# and email address.  You tell everyone you must call it a night, then call a cab to get home and get ready for your date.

 

B)   You started out drinking a couple of waters but now it is just alcohol.  You take a shot of tequila and shout over to the loud table next to you to shut up and quit spilling their damn beer.  You started off funny and entertaining, but have been getting louder and sloppier as the night wears on, knocking a beer over on the table which does not impress your boss.  You run your hands up and down the leg of the cute coworker and give him your phone# with a wink.  After some deliberation, the rest of the crew talks you into taking a cab instead of driving.  So you have one more shot and then take the cab home to get ready for your date.

 

C)   You have been drinking steadily since the moment you got there and are now hammered.  You stumble over to the loud people next to you, pick up one of their beers and dump it all over their table.  Then you come back laughing like it was the funniest thing anyone has ever done.  You order a round of shots and then laughingly tell the waitress to put it on your boss’s tab.  He is not only unimpressed, but getting concerned at your loud boorish behavior.  You knock over two beers, tell a few jokes that go nowhere while laughing loudly at them, and everyone is staring at you.  Your cute coworker excuses himself to go the bathroom so you follow him and try to make out with him at the entrance to the bathroom.  After getting rejected, you return to the table angry, down two more shots that you found on the table, grab your keys and announce that you have somewhere better to be.  Your boss demands that you give him your keys and he calls you a cab.  You get home, pass out, and never hear the door knocking for your date.

 

D)  You have been drinking 2 drinks for every 1 drink that everyone else is having.  You always have to be the drunkest and craziest at every public function that you attend.  You have not paid for a single drink and have knocked over almost as many as you have drank.  People are leaving just to get away from you.  You tell the cute co-worker that you want to f*ck his brains out right there in the bar.  He leaves.  As an angry drunk, you stumble over to the loud table next to you and tip it over sending beer and glass everywhere.  The manager is called and he runs over to kick you out of the bar.  You start screaming and yelling that you are going to sue him.  You tell him his bar sucks and then grab your keys to drive home.  Your boss tries to wrestle the keys away from you, but you vomit all down the front of his shirt.  Feeling renewed, you try to climb behind the bar to poor yourself a fresh drink.  The cops are called and you spend the night in detox, with charges pending.

 

5) The final question has to do with financial savvy.  This time I will give you 4 possible scenarios.  Review carefully and decided which one most closely describes you:

A)   You have a checking account and a savings account both with comfortable balances.  You have never paid a bill late or bounced a check in your life.  You have excellent credit.  You have several credit cards, but you never carry a balance.  You have a stocks & bonds portfolio earning money with your job’s HRA and/or independently.  You get a nice tax refund every year.  You have no problem lending people money, but you hate to owe anyone.  You use coupons when food shopping and try to shop on Wednesdays when it is double-coupon day.  You rarely impulse buy stuff just for the sake of buying it, unless it is something small like a CD.  On large purchases like TV’s or cars you research carefully for the best deal.  In short you are incredibly responsible with money.

 

B)   You have a checking account and a savings account both with something in each.  You sometimes pay bills late and have bounced a few checks.  You have fairly good credit.  You have several credit cards, but you carry a balance on one of them.  You have an HRA at work, but contribute just a small amount.  You break even on taxes every year.  You owe friends money, but they know you are good for it and you will pay them back eventually.  You do not use coupons but you are not against them if you happen to have one.  You love to shop for yourself within your means, but you own way more clothes than any one person needs.  On large purchases like TV’s or cars you do not research, but go with what you want.  In short you are somewhat responsible with money, but can be reckless at times.

 

C)   You have a minimal checking account and no savings account, often living paycheck to paycheck.  You sometimes pay your bills late and are no stranger to bouncing a check.  You have poor credit.  You have two credit cards, but they are maxed out.  You have no HRA or any financial plan for retirement.  You owe back taxes.  You owe all your friends money, to the point that they have stopped helping you out.  You think coupons are a waste of time.  You love to shop for yourself and do so in stores, online, and on the Home Shopping Network.  You judge your boyfriend by how much stuff he buys you.  Large purchases like TV’s or cars always get repossessed for lack of payment.  In short you are irresponsible with money to the point that it is a problem in your life.

 

D)  You have no checking account or savings account or credit cards because no bank will have you due to your abysmal credit score.  You always pay your bills late if at all.  Your poor credit score has a lot to do with the 2 times you have declared bankruptcy.  You just applied for a credit card that has a 28% interest rate, a $400 credit limit, and a $275 filing fee…just so you can get the $125 available credit to go shopping with.  You have zero financial plan for retirement and do not care.  The IRS is after you, and debt collectors are constantly calling you.  You owe everyone money, to the point that you have few friends left.  You hate coupons.  You are a shopping junkie.  You leach off your boyfriends until they wise up and dump you.  Large purchases like TV’s or cars are not an option since you do not have any money.  In short you are the worst with money to the point that you should be in jail and probably will be when the IRS catches up with you.

When you get your 5 answers you need to convert the letters to numbers.  Here is the conversion chart:

A = 4
A-/B+ = 5
B = 6
B-/C+ = 7
C = 8
C-/D+ = 9
D = 10

You then add up total of the five numbers and divide by 5.  That is where your woman falls on the 'Crazy' scale.  As I said my wife Nadia scored an impressive 4.8 so she is an 8/4.8 'Unicorn'.  If she was any less-crazy I might start wondering if she used to be a dude.  When finished with the test, she came up with a question for me however.  I don't what the hell she is trying to get at, but I will show it to you anyways:

I am trying to talk to my husband about something that I think is really important and hoping that he will let me vent and listen to me so that I will feel better about whatever it is.  His response is:

A)   Sits and listens to me until I am done venting and then asks how he can help.

 

B)   Listens for 1 minute and then throws a half-assed solution my way that I obviously already considered with no thought behind it just to shut me up.

 

C)   Pretends to be listening but is actually looking at his phone the whole time and has no idea what I am talking about.

 

D)  Starts playing ‘Smoke On The Water’ on his electric guitar with the amp cranked to ‘10’ to get me out of the room asap.

Munich, Germany

So picking up where my 8/16/13 blog entry ‘Austria’ left off, my girlfriend Lona and I left Vienna, Austria the night of 8/26/90 on an overnight train to Munich, Germany.  We were in the last month of a backpacking trip through Europe that started in Greece back in April and would not end until September in Ireland.  We were still a bit buzzed from spending the afternoon drinking in the park with three homeless people we had met in Vienna, and we were dead tired.  We could not find an empty sleeper car though so we gamely sat in our uncomfortable Eurail-pass seats and tried to get some sleep.  What helped was the scruffy guy sitting a few seats behind us in the back corner that offered us some hash.  Lona declined but I took a hit and then we went to sleep.  We were woken up at 4:30 am to the sounds of scary men in uniforms with guns stomping through our car.  It was the German border patrol and they were checking passports.  I was nervous, thinking about the hash and for a split-second thought of the acid I had brought from the USA to Europe 4 months earlier.  That was long gone though as we had eaten it all in Greece before leaving for Italy.  The guards stared sternly at us and our passports, stamped them and moved on.  The scruffy hash-guy was nowhere to be seen and I sleepily wondered what became of him.  We fell back asleep but not for long as we were only a couple hours from Munich.

We got off the train at 7 am on the morning of 8/27/90 and began searching for the cheap-hotel/youth-hostel information board that was in every train station.  Suddenly a lady ran up to us holding a fanny-pack and in broken English asked if it was ours.  HOLY F*CKING SHIT!  My fanny-pack containing both of our passports and several thousand dollars in travelers checks.  Everything that was of any value to us was in there and I cannot even fathom what we would have done had we lost it.  I’d had that thing strapped to my waist and tucked under my shirt day and night for much of the last 4 months, but for some reason I must have unsnapped it on the train, left it on our seat and walked away.  We thanked her profusely and then set about finding our next place to sleep.

After cashing in some of our travelers checks for Deutsch Marks we found a circus tent that offered foam rubber pads and blankets for $4 per night.  Interesting.  Gross, but interesting.  We were so elated though at having all of or money back after our near miss in the train station that we decided to splurge and get a real hotel room.  It was $53, but it had a shower and laundry and we felt like we were in heaven after our last few nights on the trains.  We took a shower and a nap and then pored over the Let’s Go Europe book that had been given to us in Zurich and decided how to spend our day.

First we took a city train to the Deutsches Museum.  As the world’s largest museum of space and technology it was freaking huge and cost us 2 Deutsch Marks each to get in.  We had a lunch of white sausages at the restaurant at the top of the museum, and then spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around looking at the 28,000 various objects on display.  After a train ride back to our hotel we did our laundry and headed for the nearest outdoor beer hall.

We walked over to Lowenbraukeller, Lowenbrau’s version of the quintessential German beer hall:  good beer, great food, fun crowd, and awesome barmaids.  As an import-beer in the United States Lowenbrau gets a bad rap, but over there straight from the tap it was awesome.  The sausage-potato soup we ordered was absolutely delicious.  The clientele was drunk and festive.  And the beautiful, strong, blonde waitresses with ample breasts heaving out of the top of their tight German barmaid outfits while carrying ridiculously large trays covered with huge mugs of beer were incredible to watch.  It had all of the right ingredients for the perfect evening, except we were almost out of money and the banks were closed so we could not exchange any more travelers checks.  We had just enough Deutsch Marks left for two beers each and the soup.  Two beers was not enough for this wonderful place and we sat at our outdoor table wistfully looking around at all the happy drunk people.  Could we somehow finagle a beer or two out of a friendly face…latch onto a nice table where people were buying rounds and the table was covered with beers?

Suddenly to our left I heard some Americans talking.  Hmm…with a big charming smile I walked over to a table of six obviously American tourists and asked where they were from.  As was the custom when talking to strangers in Europe they started with the nearest large city, which was Chicago.  I brightened and said:  “Oh really?  Me too!”  Then the process of narrowing down the location continued when I said:  “Actually, I’m more up by Milwaukee, north of Chicago.”  “Oh really?  Us too!”, one of them proclaimed.  ‘Awesome’ I thought to myself.  Then one of them said:  “To be more specific, we’re from Waukesha, a suburb of Milwaukee.”  This was going better than I could have ever imagined.  “Me too!" I exclaimed.  "I went to Waukesha North High School!”  Then one of them said:  “Well, actually we’re from the little town of Wales, just west of Waukesha.”  Unf*cking believable.  “Me too!" I said.  As it turns out, they were three middle-aged couples from Wales, WI visiting Germany together.  Not only were we neighbors, but when I had my paper route as a kid I used to deliver the Milwaukee Journal to them.  Crazy…I was in a beer hall on the other side of the world talking to some ex-neighbors.  After all that I figured they would just have to invite a nice young couple like us to sit at their table and have beers with them.  Nope.  After a small chat, with us still standing there uninvited to sit down, they all just stared at us like they were waiting for us to walk away.  So we did.  Bummer.  ‘A-holes’ we thought.

Dejected at our failure of procuring any free beers, we went back to our table and nursed our final beer.  We had fun people watching but our night there ended when we sadly witnessed something I have never seen before or since.  The whole time we were there I simply could not get over the strength of the amazingly beautiful barmaids carrying HUGE trays around over their heads with a dozen gigantic beers in huge heavy glass mugs on each tray.  In addition to their strength I admired their prowess, zooming through the crowds with these things and then carefully unloading them at a table.  I happened to be watching one particularly buxom lass when suddenly one of the beers slipped off the tray as she was walking and crashed to the ground with a deafening ‘CRASH!’.  Beer and broken glass splashed everywhere.  Her tray was now off-balance though and the sudden loss of weight on one side of the tray caused the other side to dip down.  So then another beer slid off that edge and came crashing down with an equally large ‘CRASH!’ and splash…and then another and another…  By now everyone in the beer hall was looking at her in horror as the scene repeated itself over and over again until all 12 beers had taken turns committing suicide, jumping to their deaths off of the tray.  When the final beer came crashing down and the poor barmaid was left holding an empty tray, the place was utterly silent and I have never felt so bad for anyone.  I could not stand watching the poor woman’s distress anymore so when she ran to get a mop we left, not wanting to have to watch her clean up the huge pile of glass and beer.

We got to bed at 11:30 pm.  The next morning was 8/28/90 and our plan was to go to the city of Rosenheim for a festival that we had heard about.  It was not Oktoberfest time yet, but it was summer and there were a lot of festivals around Germany.  We decided we would spend the day there partying at the festival and then take an overnight train that night to Berlin.  So we ate our free breakfast and packed up all of our newly-laundered clothes thanks to our wonderful hotel and headed for the train station.  It was only a 45 minute train ride to Rosenheim, but we must have gotten bad information because when we got there we could not find any festival.  So we tried to get a room but there were not any rooms available anywhere.  I tried to call ahead from a telephone booth to Berlin to book us a room there for the night, but I could not seem to get through to anyone and it cost us $4 for nothing.  I got really mad and took it out on Lona, swearing and being a dick.  Sorry Lona.

So we got out our Let’s Go Europe and tried to figure out where to go next.  We looked at a few cities between us and Berlin, but knowing we had only scratched the surface of all the cool stuff to do in Munich we decided to take a train back there for more sightseeing.  First we went to St. Peter’s Church (Peterskirche) and climbed the 306 steps to the top of its 92 meter tall tower.  Built in 1150 it is Munich’s oldest church, it has eight clock-faces and great views of the city.  Then we made it over to the Glockenspiel for the 5 pm viewing of its show.  It has 43 bells and 32 life-size figures that re-enacts a couple of stories from the 1500’s.  After the 15 minute show we went to the Hofbrauhaus, one of Munich’s oldest beer halls founded in 1589.  We had dinner there and got fairly drunk on their incredible beer.

After many beers we headed to the train station for the 10 hour overnight train to Berlin.  The train was so packed though that there were no more empty seats.  We tried every car and could not find two seats together.  We headed to where the sleeper cars were and could not find any space there either so we just laid our backpacks down in the hallway and used them for pillows as we tried to sleep on the floor.  Luckily we were still buzzed because the floor was disgusting, full of sticky beer and spit and garbage.  We tried to get some sleep but it was loud, with drunk people stepping over/around/on us all night.  We finally woke up for good at 7 am in Berlin on 8/29/90.  We had a blast in Munich, but we were really looking forward to seeing the Wall in Berlin…or what was left of it as it had just come down on 11/9/89.  I will pick up there on a future blog entitled ‘Berlin, Germany’.

Last Weekend

So last Friday me, Nadia and our two kids Autumn and Jack drove from Minneapolis to Milwaukee for the weekend for our niece’s graduation and four out-of-the-ordinary things happened.

First of all, Friday June 6^th was the 13-year anniversary of my wife’s dad’s death.  He died while on vacation in Milwaukee, visiting his son’s family (my wife’s brother).  It was his wedding anniversary and he was at a Milwaukee Brewers game with his wife and their two young grandkids when he suddenly died of a heart attack in his seat.  Just horrible.  So half-way to Milwaukee my wife Nadia was commenting on how it was ironic and sad that we were going to visit her brother in Milwaukee on the same day that their dad had died there 13 years ago.  Suddenly on I-94 the car started making a horrible scraping sound.  We got off at the next exit which led to a small town and I pulled into the parking lot of the nearest gas station.  The front of the heat-shield under the engine had come loose and was scraping the ground.  Holy hell, we were in a small town in the middle of nowhere and I thought we were f*cked.

I went into the station and the kid behind the counter told me there was a garage just down the street.  We headed down the road and suddenly there was Steve’s Auto Shop there on the right.  Nadia’s dad’s name was Steve.  A nice young man with a ‘Steve Jr.’ patch on his chest was standing there almost as if he was waiting for us.  He told us to pull in and said to keep the car running, don’t even bother to get out.  He jacked the front end up, crawled underneath, replaced a couple of screws and said we were good to go.  He would not even let us give him any money.  It reminded me of the scene in ‘Groundhog Day’ when Bill Murray would change the flat tire for those old ladies.  It was totally crazy cool.  ‘Steve’ had saved us.

The second thing that happened was later that day when we had made it to Nadia’s brother’s house.  Our niece had gotten a bunch of checks for graduation presents and she had them all stacked on a table.  I walked by and happened to notice the top check was from a ‘Lucille Daggett’.  That name sounded familiar so I asked my sister-in-law who Lucille was.  She said it was her aunt.  I told her I come from a Daggett family on my grandmother’s side, Meryl Daggett.  We laughed at how wouldn’t it be funny if we were related.  She then asked her Dad in the next room about it and he came in and said Meryl sounded familiar.  Then we threw around some other familiar family names and then he said, wait, here’s a weird one from long ago:  ‘Dorcus’.  Oh my god, we have a Dorcus in our family tree too!  I am having my aunt send me a family tree, but it seems likely that we are all related by blood through the Daggett family…so my sister-in-law may also be my distant cousin or something.

The third thing that happened was Saturday night at the graduation party when my 2-year old son Jack and I were wrestling.  It was about 8 pm and we were just about to head back to our hotel soon.  I was on the couch and he was jumping all over me and the couch when suddenly Jack started crying.  I am not sure what exactly happened but he was crying and holding his arm.  He is normally pretty tough but he would not stop crying and was holding his arm close to his stomach and would not move it.  I thought I must have broken his arm so we rushed him to the nearest ER.  They took x-rays and nothing came up so after awhile a doctor came in and said his elbow is probably just dislocated.  Then she just snapped it right back in place.  Totally better.  Jack was back to his ol’ happy self like it never happened.  Phew!  We did not get back to hotel until 11pm, but were so glad it was nothing serious.

The fourth thing also involved Jack.  For some reason throughout the whole weekend he kept telling us when he had to pee.  So we would rush him to the bathroom, take off his diaper and he would go in the potty.  He had gone in the potty-chair at home every once in awhile, but this was the entire weekend!  He was so excited, and so were we.  He did not pee in his diaper all weekend.  So when we got back on Sunday we stopped and bought him a pack of Spider-Man big-boy underpants and now he is out of diapers.  He potty-trained himself over the weekend!

Anyways, I hope you all had a good weekend and I hope this one coming up is even better!  I’m going to see Bob Weir’s band Ratdog tonight at the Northrop Auditorium…and looking forward to hanging out with my friends Mitch Marshall, Thor Ekblom, and my old friend Travelin’ Dave who is driving up from Milwaukee.

Living With One Arm

Two weeks ago I had rotator cuff surgery on my right shoulder.  The pictures above are step-by-step photos taken during the surgery as the tear in the rotator cuff is being sewn up.  I first hurt it about 5 years ago while playing softball for a local Minneapolis beer-league team, the Gonghitters.  We were an awesome, fun bunch of friends and we had a lot of good times and even managed to win a few ballgames.  One night while playing in center-field I tried to throw out a runner in a close game and I felt my shoulder pop as I had given it all I had on the throw.  Raging shoulder pain and my right arm was dead.  For the rest of the game and the season I was relegated to playing first base.  It hurt but as long as I did not make any throws or try to reach something from a high cupboard I could live with it.

 

Coincidentally later that summer I injured my left shoulder during a routine drinking accident.  I was at a family reunion in Amherst, WI playing ‘kick-the-can’ with all my fun, cool cousins at my aunt and uncle’s farm.  It was about 1 a.m. and while running around with a huge beer mug full of cheap wine in my left hand I slipped on the wet grass.  My feet went out from under me while rounding a corner and my main concern was saving the wine.  As my feet slid out to the right my arm went out to the left and I landed flush on my left side with my arm straight out.  My beer mug was still in hand resting on the ground, vertically with wine intact.  Phew.  I was drunk but vaguely aware of intense pain in my left shoulder.  The left was not as bad as the right, but now both shoulders were shot.

 

When we got back to Minneapolis I went to a doctor and was prescribed physical therapy.  Over the last 5 years I would rehab the shoulders for awhile, they would feel better, but then the first throw of a ball or pulling my kids on a sled and the shoulder(s) would be shot again.  More rehab in my gym at work, I would feel better for awhile, then throw them out again.  I finally decided this April to have them re-looked at by a doctor.  X-rays determined the left side had a torn labrum, and the right side had a torn labrum and rotator cuff damage.  A follow-up MRI on the right side revealed the rotator cuff was indeed torn.  With my 2 and 4 year old kids starting to get into sports, I decided I wanted to be able to play ball with them and it was time for surgery.  I would have surgery on the right side, and then rehab both sides with physical therapy.

 

The surgery was fine but I do not remember much of the 3 days afterwards as I was zonked out on Oxycontin and Percocet.  While sitting home on the couch those first few days I made the mistake of watching some of my dvr’d TV shows, including the season finale of ‘The Following’ which I now have no recollection of.  I do not enjoy being a zombie as well as the constipation that goes along with it (is that why zombies in real life are so angry?) so I quit the pills cold turkey after the third day.  The constipation and fogginess ended but I went through a withdrawal period complete with hot flashes, nausea and massive headaches.

 

That is all over with now but in the weeks since I have had to wear a sling on my right arm 24 hours a day, taking it off only for showers and my daily arm exercises.  I cannot lay down flat with it on so I have to sleep in a recliner chair surrounded by pillows.  I have to wear it for one full month before it comes off permanently and I start physical therapy.  My wife Nadia and the kids have been great, picking up the slack on all the chores around the house while Dad slums around.  I had taken 2+ weeks off of work, but after 8 days I got bored of sitting around the house watching soap operas and decided to come back to work.  (On that note, ‘Days Of Our Lives’ has gotten really juicy lately...I am so glad that jerk Nick is finally dead...or is he?!).

 

Learning to be left-handed sucks though.  Showering and getting dressed for work takes twice as long.  Brushing my teeth, shaving, combing my hair, wiping my butt, eating...it all sucks doing it with the wrong hand.  I have gotten used to it, but a few things still remain a challenge.  The little things that require two hands like tying my shoes, reading the kids a story, putting on a coat or buttoning my shirts and jeans are maddening.  I now only wear pullover shirts (a challenge in itself) and have abandoned jeans in favor of my black Hugh Hefner lounge pants with an elastic waist band.  Putting on my seatbelt or belting my kids is a struggle and has turned me into a contortionist.  Typing is no picnic and after 8 hours at work sitting in front of a computer my shoulder gets a bit sore.  A lot of little things that I normally take for granted have now become work.

 

I have also found out that it is hard to pee with one hand.  Try it guys, peeing with only your left hand.  Usually I hold my shirt up with left hand while my right hand does all the heavy lifting, shaking, etc.  It is difficult with just one hand to pull down the front of my lounge pants, pull out my weiner and hold my shirt up while peeing.  Just this morning here at work my shirt slipped down and fell in front of my weiner while it was going.  The onrushing pee soaked my shirt, splashed down onto my pants and while trying to get everything back in its right place I got pee all over my hand as well.  Gross.  I washed my hand in the sink and used water and a paper towel to mop up all the pee on my clothes, but my clothes are all wet.  I made a dash for my desk and have not moved since.

 

As I said typing is a pain and this story is taking awhile.  My clothes are starting to dry off now and I should get back to work, so I think I will close this entry.  All in all this surgery and the follow-up care has not been nearly as bad as I thought.  You do what you got to do and move on.  It has made me appreciate both my arms and how hard life must be for amputees.  I am looking forward to getting the sling off in two weeks and get on with rehab, but in the meantime I may start bringing an extra pair of pants to work...