The Myth of Privatization

I've been a Comcast subsriber for 3 years now. My RCA cable modem has always been a bit tempermental about its power cable but just this weekend, it became unbearable. I finally broke down and called their tech support and was told to just take it to my local office and exchange it. I also had the option to buy my own and save $3 per month on my bill, but after scouring the web I deciced that $36 a year is worth the convenience of being able to just take it in and exchange it when it breaks.

Anyway, I got to the local office 10 minutes before they close and it was just like walking into the post office- same counter scheme, same long line, same sense of confusion as to why the 3 people being helped are taking 20 minutes a piece with their transactions. And, get this, there was one employee at her station with a "next desk please" plaque out dutifully doing her paperwork for the day and never looking up at any of us waiting in line. It took 20 minutes of standing there before I was acknowledged or helped.

So, uh, the next time you have to listen to some idiot talk about how government bureaucracies are so inefficient and everything would be better if we started privatizing everything, you can tell them to shut the fuck up. Private industry is no better and certainly no more efficient than any government bureaucracy. Hell, I think they might even be worse. At least at the Post Office these days, you can take a number and find a seat if one is available, if you go to my local Comcast office to exchange your malfunctioning cable modem, you have to stand in line in order to keep your place.

Wilco Live, Kingsbury Hall, Salt Lake City, UT November 22, 2004

So, after eating too much at Charlie Chow's Dragon Grill, four of us made it to Kingsbury Hall and thought we'd missed the opening act, Calexico. Fortunately, we were wrong and Calexico turned out to be really quite good. They were a very fun amalgamation of country & western, mariachi, 60's Bond themes, and rock. Surprisingly, their horn players would show up later to help with a few songs in the Wilco set. If you haven't heard Calexico, assuming their recorded work reflects their live set, you should check them out.

What can I say about finally seeing Wilco? I've wanted to see these guys play live from the time I started rabidly listening to "Summer Teeth" back in 1999. I really wanted to during my whole Billy Bragg & Wilco era of 2000 - 2002. I remember being in Phoenix in February 2002 and seeing a flyer that Wilco were going to be playing there just after I left and feeling frustrated that they were coming to Arizona but not Utah. So, there I was last night in the beautiful old Kingsbury Hall on the University of Utah campus finally getting to see Wilco. But, something just wasn't right. I really enjoyed the show and they were in top form, sort of.

See, a few months back, I caught Sonic Youth and Wilco live on PBS. I was flipping channels and so I'm not sure if it was an episode of Austin City limits because I missed the opening credits and I was mesmerized by Thurston's guitar playing. I've never been much of a Sonic Youth fan but I really did enjoy watching Thurston Moore play (just shy of 30 min. was about the right amount of his playing though). Then Wilco came on and this was them without Jay Bennett. Jay Bennett who was an important member of the band from A.M. throught Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Jay, the guy, I really felt empathy for as he was publicly kicked out of the band in the middle of making the movie "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart". I noticed how the arrangements of the songs with the new stripped down Jay-less lineup were rougher and noiser. And, I'm basing this on my memory, is that Jeff was overly complimentary to Thurston and Company.

Then, I bought "A Ghost Is Born" and listening to it, I couldn't help but think about that Sonic Youth/Wilco show on PBS and I began to think that maybe, without Jay Bennett's input and influence, Jeff (whether consciously or not) was now to trying and emulate Thurston Moore a bit too much. Because, much of the new album is filled with long stretches of guitar noodling and white noise. It's not bad. In fact, I really enjoy the new album. But, for some reason, I didn't enjoy it live as much as I thought I would. Even the new arrangements of songs from "Summer Teeth" and "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" just don't seem as good to me.

Of course, last night was the last night of the tour, so it's not like anyone who might read this will have fair warning to stay away if they don't like the idea of Jeff Tweedy attempting to be Thurston Moore. There was one upside last night- after the white noise set, they came out and played a really killer country set.

Why Is It Okay To Litter At The Movies?

I just got back from seeing a matinee of the new SpongeBob SquarePants movie with the wife the kiddies and two more that we borrowed for the afternoon. First off, the movie is really not very good. I was hoping it would be because the TV show is usually something both the kiddies and I can enjoy, but this time it was them being entertained and me being really bored. It wasn't quite as bad as when I took them to see that awful Dudley Do-right movie a few years back; I nearly died of boredom during that film.

Anyway, I couldn't help noticing at the end, the atrocious amount of litter left behind by everyone. It's not that I'm not used to seeing what a bunch of lazy pigs the movie goers in my town are. There's always litter left in the theater at the end of a movie, but today's display of wanton disregard for any attempt by my fellow citizens to clean up after themselves was some kind of record. They really outdid themselves today.

Seriously, how hard would it be for them to keep track of their popcorn buckets, half gallon cups of carbonated, artificially flavored sugar water, cheese pizza boxes, or hot dog trays and carry them to the exit when they leave? Isn't it bad enough that we're helping to put all that mostly non-recyclable waste in our landfills, but then they've got to show just how much they don't care by being such thoughtless wonks that they feel entitled to just leave it on the floor and walk out like they didn't put it there. I saw a mini army of five theater employees cleaning up the cess pool my fellow Salt Lakers had managed to create in the 90 minutes that SpongeBob and Patrick had attempted (but failed) to entertain me? If people can't pick up after themselves in a movie theater, how am I supposed to not believe that I live amongst a bunch of spoiled and pampered slobs? I wonder if it's this way everywhere? Is this going on all over the U.S., or is this just a Utah thing? Is this same behavior displayed by movie patrons in Canada, the European Union, or anywhere else in the world?

"I don't want to be an American idiot"

Green Day's "American Idiot" has become my latest favorite tune. I find it very cathartic in helping to relieve my post election blues. I've never been much of a Green Day fan. I first heard them on a 5 track promo/sampler cassette that Liz gave me when she was managing a record store and my first impression of their song "Long View" was that they sounded too much like the 80's punk band Circle Jerks. Also, they became so popular so quickly, which only reinforced my snobby revulsion for them. It can take me a long time to forgive bands for having great commercial success. It took me 10 years to forgive U2 and finally actually listen to "Achtung Baby".

I first saw the video for "American Idiot" on the iTunes Music Store about 2 weeks ago. I immediately noticed snippets of the lyrics, things like "welcome to a new kind of tension, all across the idiot nation" and "well maybe I'm the faggot america, I'm not part of a red neck agenda" and "everything isn't meant to be okay". In a time when for many people, "values" seem to be defined by things like "no abortions" and "no queers", instead of things like love, tolerance, compassion, social justice, individuality, and equality, it feels good to hear someone sing a passionate, angry, and infectiously catchy song about how stupid some of our population is.

Even though I'm married and have two kids, it feels good to start thinking about being part of "faggot america" and not part of "a redneck agenda", not that I'm thinking of switching to being gay or deciding to explore bisexuality, but because I'd rather be a part of "faggot america" if that means that gay people can have the same rights that heterosexual people have. Also, I think that the term "faggot america" is being used in the song much same the way nigger, fag, & dyke are now used by blacks, gays, & lesbians- take the epithet thrown at you and adopt it as a badge of honor.

If not hating gay people and thinking they should have equal rights makes me part of "faggot america", then count me in. Also, If I keep listening to this song, I may have to swallow my pride, admit that I was wrong about Green Day, and finally purchase one of their albums.

"Underwear Goes Inside The Pants"

If you haven't seen the video for Lazyboy's "Underwear Goes Inside The Pants" yet, you owe it to yourself to check it out. It's a hilarious and poignant look at some socio-political issues in contemporary American culture. It includes commentary on things like marijuana legalization, legal drug advertising on TV, the obesity epidemic, and our treatment of homeless people. I'm sure you can get it elsewhere, but here's the link to see it at the iTunes Music Store.

First Post

Wow. Some people made it insanely easy for anyone to publish their thoughts on the web and all it serves to do is prove that most of us don't have anything worth saying.