Project961.com

I suppose since I watch a minimal amount of television and listen mainly to AM radio that it should be acceptable for an FM station to try and target their advertising to me via a mailed postcard, but come on -- at least make it appealing to the reader. A local station is apparently running a promotion where they're giving away fully restored muscle cars to their listeners. Huzzah!


On the front of the postcard are three cars deemed "muscle cars" by the ad folks at Atlanta's WKLS 96.1. Recognizable to me is the 60-something-model Mustang, mainly because in college I dated a girl who drove one. She always complained about having to change the spark plugs. Lucky for me she wasn't one of those chicks who expected her beau to be car-savvy. This may surprise some of you who know me, but my knowledge about automobiles extends only to cranking them and filling them up with gas. I don't know a sparkplug from a mucus plug.


What gets me is the youngspeak language used on the card. Get this:


Nothing says "guy card" like owning a fully restored American Muscle Car!


What does it mean to be a "guy card" holder? Isn't guy too broad of a term to merit cardship? It just sounds too much like saying "human card" or "omnivore card" to me. Or am I wrong to assume by guy they mean male?

Here's another one:

Plus, we're hookin a brotha up for the Fall race weekend at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Call it narrow minded on my part, but I think the term brotha should be reserved for men who have at least some degree of sub-Saharan African ancestry. You know what else? I've never been to the Atlanta Motor Speedway, but something tells me the aforementioned brothas aren't in high number at a venue known primarily for offering beer-swilling White guys a place to watch souped up racecars crash into each other. The postcard may as well say Plus, we're hookin a brotha up with full hockey gear and two backstage passes to Barry Manilow.

Those folks at WKLS 96.1 sure know how to help a brotha out, don't they?

Oh well. Guess I have to cash in my guy card.

County Seat presents The Philadelphia Story at the Aurora Theater

My feet are of clay. Do you know it?

Or shall I say Do you know what having feet of clay means? I didn't, so I axed the Google.

Having feet of clay means to have some weakness that your admirers weren't aware of before but have only recently come to discover. One innerweb reference sites James Joyce, that dead Irishman, as the source but I think somehow the expression dates back to the Bible. I don't know for sure that it came from the Bible. I'm just guessing. Hell, I went to public school.

I don't get to say the line; the lead actress does. Lead actresses get all the best lines but the question is: Who gets the girl in the end? I know already.

So there!

Another favorite line of mine is You! All of you! And your damned sophisticated ideas! I know this sounds a bit antiquated, but the play takes place in the post-depression thirties. Why don't people talk like this anymore? Hell, I don't know. I went to public school.

Come to think of it, I'm 35 and my 20s were a nightmare. Am I in my post-depression thirties?

Anyway, back at the ranch . . .

Community theater is like a drug for me. I know when I sign up to be in a show that I really shouldn't take the time and energy away from my family, but somehow the altered state of consciousness known as the stage beckons to me in an impelling voice that somehow can't be ignored. So I take that first hit, enjoy that momentary euphoria felt while on stage, and then I crash and burn when it's time to take down the set at the end of a run.

I can't very well knock community theater though. I met my wife that way. And as far as lead actresses go, she's the tops. The absolute tops, my dear.

More theatrical banter from me -- sorry.

For those unfamiliar with community theater, let me briefly summarize. A bunch of people come together to prance around on stage pretending to be people they're not. They do this for no reward other than the intrinsic value of escaping reality even if only for a few stolen hours of a few Tuesday and Thursday evenings. Almost always, there's some egotistic jamoke of mediocre talent who shows up and gets a part.

In our production, that someone is me. I will continue to belt out my lines and hog the spotlight for as long as they'll have me. My view on acting is summed up thusly:

blah blah blah MY LINE blah blah blah MY LINE blah blah blah MY LINE

That's what real life's really about, isn't it? What is it Shakespeare said?

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players
who can't remember their lines.

Okay, now I'm just projecting, but you get the idea.

In case you were wondering, our little gem of a show runs Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings at 8:00 PM from Sept 20^th through the 29^th and at 2:30 PM on Sundays Sept 23^rd and 30^th. Tickets can be purchased by clicking hither. Yes, you'll have to register if you don't already have an online presence with the Aurora Theater in Lawrenceville, GA but that's just one of those cyber hoops we have to occasionally jump through. Ya dig? Alternatively you can give them a ring at 770-476-7926 .


Furthermore, I realize that the Aurora (like many other theatrical groups out there) likes to refer to themselves as a "theatre" with an R-E as opposed to an E-R, but guess what?

I don't roll that way.

So booyah!

My feet are of clay. Do you know it?

Zoo Atlanta panda turns one; Human baby not amused.

Meryl and I went to her first marsupial birthday party today. Oh, sure, she's been to a human birthday party, but today was the day that Atlanta-born panda, Mei Lan, celebrated her first trip around the sun at our zoo. There was much ado.

The guest list included such dignitaries as Atlanta Mayor Shirley Franklin, Georgia's lieutenant governor, and various muckety mucks from Delta Airlines, the city of Chengdu in China and Zoo Atlanta.

To make a long story short, Meryl, who recently turned sixteen months old herself, started to break down shortly after we got to the event. To her defense, I must say the party's opening ceremonies were anything but kid friendly. I basically spent thirty minutes trying to hold a struggling baby while listening to some suits from far and wide drone on about Chinese-American relations, direct flights from Atlanta to China and whatnot.

To paraphrase it went something like this:

Mei Lan's parents came to us from China applause applause applause It is important that Atlanta maintain good relations with the Chinese applause applause applause The panda is a symbol of peace applause applause applause.

When the vice mayor of Chengdu finished speaking in his native Mandarin I thought it only polite to applaud for him as well. I was one of the few. Then his interpreter went up to the mic and translated into English what he had said. I forget her exact words but it was something about the research center and artificial insemination. I felt kinda dumb having applauded but hey, who doesn't like panda husbandry?

The line of vacant strollers outside the tent had led me to believe that taking one inside would be frowned upon. Again, I was in the minority with my assumption. For every stroller left outside there were three or four inside. Only, the strollers inside were occupied by sippy-cup wielding panda seekers, some of whom had already started to cry.

When I tired of trying to hold a baby that obviously didn't want to be held, I made a brief retreat outside in order to reclaim our stroller. Meryl refused to be strapped in, so I held one handle while she pushed the thing around in circles. This game entertained her for a few short minutes until she ran into an important looking Chinese guy in a designer suit and man purse. He quickly braced her so as not to let her fall backwards and then smiled at me. Meryl did not feel the love however and shrieked at him, I imagine, simply for being in her way. I said thank you in Chinese, one of the few expressions I know and whisked her and the stroller away.

Some kids and parents had made their way to a second tent where birthday cake was to be served. Meryl and I headed there but found the crowd to be too close-knit and not conducive to a now overly-tired baby with a bad case of stroller rage. So instead I let her push the stroller around the zoo.

I tried to point out a small-clawed otter but she paid it no mind. A kimodo dragon also proved to be no competition for pushing a stroller along the pavement. Not even an elephant phased her.

Then she fell. This is when all baby hell broke loose.

Meryl starts to get clumsy when she gets tired. When she falls this only aggravates the crankiness. After righting her and trying again to put her in the stroller I ended up just standing under the awning of the tiger exhibit and watched as she screamed. It wasn't her hurt scream either. It was just the scream she uses when she tries to get the attention of anyone around. We are still trying to decipher her toddler babble but I think in her blood curdling voice she was shouting something like everyone please look at my inept father!

Oh, the joys of parenthood.

I finally hog tied my kid into the stroller and quickly tried to find the exit. Never in my life have I wanted to leave a zoo faster than I did today. To add to my frustration, I could not find the way out for anything, so I just pushed a screaming baby through the serpentine maze we call the zoo while captive animal after captive animal retreated to their respective hidey holes to get away from the piercing noise. It was bad. I briefly pictured my daughter being raised by a nice leopard family.

The only thing that calmed Meryl down was the rhythm of street musicians outside the zoo in Grant Park. I briefly pictured my daughter being raised by a nice couple of bongo-playing Rastafareans.

I'm only joking.

They could have been Episcopalian for all I know.

When we encountered a man playing blues on the guitar Meryl stopped crying for a moment and looked up at him as though to say I feel your pain. When he finished one song I thanked him and explained that she too had been singing the blues ever since we left the zoo.

"I'll play a little somethin' nice for her," he said before strumming a few chords.

Meryl started crying again so I thanked the musician again and pushed Meryl quickly to the car. As I was strapping her into the seat I could still here him singing Summertime and the livin' is easy.

We never did see any panda, much less birthday cake.

Oh well.

Happy birthday, Mei Lan.