The Caddo Sessions - June 13, 2015

If you know me and the music bug that's buzzed around my life for as long as I can remember, then you are aware of my tastes for different flavors. The only thing I've ever been able to compare it to is food as I like to mix things up like a chef in a kitchen just to see what it tastes like. And finally after so long of wanting to do this, I'm able to throw several dishes on the table mixed the way I've always wanted them to be and serve them to a small intimate crowd right here in downtown Tyler, Texas.

So what am I cooking? For years, we've thrown soul, blues and bluegrass around a campfire at Caddo Lake with close friends. This allowed me to expand on sounds that I was never able to experience within the guettos of South Dallas. But while doing this, that music bug would never leave me alone wanting me to add more to the flavor within those deep Caddo woods.

After twenty years of wondering what it would sound like, I'm happy to share with you something brand new that no one has ever done before on stage. We'll be adding soul to the sounds of bluegrass with David Brashier on dobro, David Burns on drums, my background vocalists and Nashville's own Chessboxer. Oh yea, I'm in there somewhere on harmonica and vocals.

Chessboxer is made up of fiddle player Ross Holmes who was recently on tour with Mumford and Sons, Matt Menefee on banjo and Royal Masat on upright bass. They will be joining me between concerts with Bruce Hornsby while performing in Dallas and then on to a show for Austin City Limits.

To purchase tickets, visit the link below: 

http://rosepickermusic.com/

Tickets are $30 for adults and $20 for children under twelve.

Liberty Hall is located at 110 W Erwin St, Tyler, TX 75702

Hey Dad...That would be a cool place to play.

When it comes to kids, they see everything. They approach life with eyes wide open so it was no surprise when my thirteen year old pointed out the stage at Bergfeld on our way to church. “Hey Dad…that would be a cool place to play…don’t you think?”

I’ve driven by Bergfeld a million times but have never given the stage a second glance really. So out of curiosity, I drove by on my way home one day, parked the truck and took a walk around the stage. Pleasantly surprised, our town has a really great stage and I don’t think anyone ever uses it.

Rolling the idea around in my head and then discussing it with Rose Festival folks, we
decided that a good way to celebrate the Strutters 75th anniversary would be to hold a concert at Bergfeld this year.

Now for some, you are all too aware of what a large production it is when I perform. Not that I’m a big deal, but I do have certain standards when it comes to equipment and not really knowing what the facility had to offer in the way of electrical, we contacted the city for further examination. And in doing so, we discovered that the stage at Bergfeld Park has enough power to run sound and lights for a Texas Stadium concert. And no, I’m not exaggerating as the Rolling Stones themselves could plug in and blow the water right out the seal fountain in our modest little park.

Learning this about Bergfeld, it made me realize just how many diamonds we have around here that no one really appreciates. I’ve been parked on the brick streets of College and University now for two years and every day I look around at what I believe could be the next Fort Worth. Buildings with incredible potential that are left empty and abandoned. My hats off to a couple of local guys for taking on the People’s Petroleum Building as it takes this kind of vision and attention to detail when you bring something like that to life again.

I had a conversation with a city councilman who received a call from someone who was barking at him about Tyler not having an outdoor venue for concerts. He calmly told them that we do but no one ever uses it. Forest for the trees I suppose.

So….on October 16th of this year, I’ll be bringing it like you’ve never imagined. In tow will be over a quarter of a million dollars in sound and lights which will exercise the power in Bergfeld and provide enough base to shake the leaves off the trees. Shouting from one of the prettiest parks in East Texas, I hope to showcase what no one really appreciates and open the eyes of Tyler to yet another diamond in the rough. And I hope that you will join me as we celebrate this park as well as the tireless efforts the Strutters put forth each year coordinating the Texas Rose Parade. It’s a great bunch of guys and I’m honored to be a part of it.

Oh...and did I mention it’s free?

See you in October. And yea Homer, that will be a cool place to play!

Much Will Be Demanded

With all the media rhetoric and political opposition that has literally consumed Americans concerning the Affordable Care Act, it's time to step back and take a deep breath. And once you've exhaled, let's all look at this debacle using some good old common sense.

First, I think we'll all agree that Obama is a big picture guy regardless of whether you like the pictures he's painting. I know a lot of CEOs as well as folks in general who have made a lot of money due to their abilities in seeing a bigger picture. But these folks were all in the private sector and weren't relying on government to execute on details. And because our government attempted to execute on a private sector level, we all stand witness to one of the biggest train wrecks in U.S. history.

Details. It's where the devil lives in all projects and anyone will tell you that big ideas always fall short due to the details. And one of the details that no one seems to be talking about is the market itself so I will ask you good folks to put on your marketing hats for a moment and hear me out.

The Affordable Care Act was created for people that can't afford health care. That's straight forward and from a business perspective, that's the target market. These are people who struggle to make ends meet. They live paycheck to paycheck and may or may not have enough money to pay their bills each month. This population represents 15 to 20% of America and is growing daily due to the great divide between wealth and poverty as the middle class continues to shrink.

In theory, this sounds great. We create a health care plan for the uninsured where payments are evened out in hopes of balancing prices for both healthy and unhealthy people. And without any marketing research on how this population lives or pays their bills, a web site was built with the hope that 7 million people will sign up for the plan and make it sustainable.

So let's take a look at this population and try to define them. How does this market behave that we know damn good and well wasn't ever really evaluated with any kind of research other than the fact that they don't have health care. Surely we can all agree that little if any research was executed in light of such a disastrous roll out. What I mean is they spent a lot of time baking the cake but bought really crappy paper plates and never found out if the market had a fork to eat it with.

I'll switch hats now for some perspective. Not to go into a great amount of detail as most of you already know I played blues music in the ghettos of south Dallas for years. I've traveled with band members, slept in their houses, rehearsed in their garages and ate at their tables. These are modest and humble people that struggle on a day to day basis. Focused on their grocery bill and the rent, budgets are extremely tight. They may have a day job while the music helps subsidize additional living expenses or the wife may work full time. Visits to the doctor are only on an as needed basis. And this as needed basis had to be pretty serious as I was called on numerous times as a taxi to Parkland due to the absence of a car.

As we evaluate this market, our government has created a system that requires the following.

1. You must apply using a web site. This means you must have a computer. Ok…let's say that all of these folks I know have a computer. Not all of them do but we'll say they do so we can move on to the next step.

2. You must have a credit card to pay the average $328 bill each month. They have a computer, in our imagination, so let's say they have a credit card as well. Not one of those debit cards you purchase at the grocery store but a real personal credit card.

3. This amount must be paid every month without fail for the program to work. That means each month that the credit card must work. Not declined and not maxed out.

It would be a stretch to think that I have any idea what it's like to live month to month even though I saw it first hand. But the elephant in the room is our own government has this market all figured out. It should be obvious that everyone  owns a computer, we all have credit cards and without a doubt, won't have any trouble making payments each month. Keep in mind that the most a lot of these folks can afford for rent is around $300 per month. A family of four may live in a one bed room apartment. They have no car and ride the bus. If they do have a car, it's used and they only put five or ten dollars of gas in it at a time. They have no bank account and live on cash. They eat fast food because it's all they can afford.  

But hey…paying $328 a month on your laptop with your own personal credit card is going to be a piece of cake.

This entire effort has about as much of a chance, if I can quote Merl Haggard, as a snowball headed for hell. But before we all stomp our feet and complain about our government, we all need to take a good hard look at ourselves. If you remember anything I've ever written on these rambling blogs, remember this my friends. Our job is to take care of the folks that need to be taken care of and if we don't do it, the government will step in and do it for us. I don't care if you're a Democrat or a Republican, you will never convince me that the government has some duty in tending to the poor. That's your job. That's my job. That's our job.

Take heed this Christmas my brothers and sisters and remember your job. A job that was given to all who have much. I believe it was our good friend Luke who said, "From everyone who has been given much, much will be demanded; and from the one who has been entrusted with much, much more will be asked."

The Crossroads

The other weekend, I played a gig in Fort Worth and was asked a question. This is a question I'm asked a lot but the answer is so long that I never quite give it the justice it deserves.

The question is simply, "Do you perform all the time and how come I've never heard of you?" Which I guess makes two questions really.

So here is my story as best I can tell it. It's long and definitely on the edge of insanity but hopefully it will settle the curiosity surrounding my musical career.

I grew up in New London, Texas which is a small East Texas town. Population of 942 people when I left and it hasn't changed all that much.

Musically, I was just like everyone else which is why most of my childhood friends had a hard time grasping my love for blues music. I was an eighties kid. Big hair rockers like Van Halen and AC/DC filled the speakers most of the time. My exposure to real music was somewhat limited due to my location but that all changed when I went to Mississippi to attend Ole Miss.

Ole Miss is another story all in itself but the short version is I never went to class. I got caught up with a senior who owned a t-shirt business and controlled pretty much all the fraternity and sorority shirts for any and all parties. A business he left to me due to my drawing abilities after my freshman year. I waisted no time in finding another vendor out of Dallas cutting out a middle man in Oxford and was pulling in a very sizable income every month in pure cash. This amount not including my allowance so throw that much money on a 19 year old kid with a very busy social calendar and there were no boundaries. I went and did pretty much as I pleased and none of it included class which would bring me back home the end of my sophomore year.

However, during those two years and all the road trips from Memphis to New Orleans, I fell in love with the blues.

When I came home, I began to practice the harmonica. I didn't have much else to do as I was attending Kilgore Junior College attempting to get my grades into shape in hopes of alleviating any laughter from Texas Christian University as they gazed upon my transcript.

For over a year and a half, I practiced that harmonica every day with a glass of scotch. Usually around two hours of practice which would earn me a spot in a Country and Western band in Gladewater on highway 80. It was the roughest joint you could imagine with a hole above the toilet in the bathroom put there by a shot gun blast. I played every Friday and Saturday night for twenty dollars a night. The beer for band members was fifty cents a bottle so the twenty dollars turned into ten dollars by the end of each night making for some interesting driving as I made my way home down highway 42.

I was finally accepted into TCU and the weekend before Dad and I were scheduled to look for apartments, our housekeeper heard me playing harmonica on the front porch. She told me I was getting pretty good and asked if I would like to follow her to Dallas the next weekend to a real blues club. I asked Dad and since we were headed that direction anyway, it sounded like a reasonable detour to make. And so we went.

Upon arriving at the original R.L. Griffin's Blues Alley in 1989, Dad and I realized we were the only white people in the joint. Dad whispered to me as low as he could, "If you don't play your ass off, we might not make it out of here alive."

We were met with stares as we slowly moved into the club and about half way through the night, I was brought up on stage as a young man from East Texas. Unbeknownst to me at the time, R.L. was from Kilgore and he was curious to see what a young white boy from East Texas might do on stage. Since we were with my housekeeper, Louise, I decided to sing the song "Louise" originally recorded by Howlin Wolf. And when I did, the whole club came undone. It was like nothing you had ever seen before as I was suddenly the long lost white boy that everyone was related to.

During my first year at TCU, I began to visit the club more frequently and R.L. and I became very close. I was his project so he would invite me in as much as he could which would lead me into acquiring my own band in 1990. The name of the band was the Little World Show Band and featured a keyboard player, bass, guitar, drums and female vocalist by the name of Lady Princess. This jaunt would go on for three years until it was cut short by one word…marriage.

I got married the same year I graduated from college which was in 1991 and that would mean leaving the juke joints behind and becoming serious about a real job. As most of you know, I'm also a designer and went into advertising as soon as I could find something permanent.

Music would take a back seat leaving me to play when my wife went out of town or sometimes I could talk her into letting me go down in the hood if it meant playing for friends. The nights were always long and coming home at three in the morning smelling like you've been rolling around in an ashtray wasn't real conducive to the married life.

These little visits to the guetto would continue until 2000 when Johnnie Taylor passed away leaving his band leader, Jack Williams, with very little to do. My wife had gone out of town with family and I found myself down at R.L.'s once again and having played with Jack a couple of times, he told me if I ever needed a twelve piece band to give him a call. He would be more than happy to back me up.

This offer ended up at the feet of my wife and her response was that as long as I played really nice events, it would be acceptable. No more blues clubs which was fine by me as I had never played with a band this size before and the thought alone surpassed any venue that we might get a chance playing. Full horn section. Back-up singers. I had to dive into old soul music just to prepare some sort of song list.

Within one year of playing with Jack, I landed a headline spot on the Texas Blues Festival as their featured artist. From there, I began to play really big social events in Dallas for five years until a group of friends along with a label approached me about producing an album. I had never done anything like this and the mere idea was very exciting.

We would soon hit the studio producing my very first and only album which would make all kinds of noise on XM Satellite radio hitting a number one pick to click. The album was being played all over the world as I received reviews from Paris, England, Germany and Italy.

That's when I got a call from a group in Dallas that wanted me to open for Al Green. He would have to approve of me first but I was their top pick for the opening act. I couldn't believe it as Al Green was huge on my playlist. Al would approve which blessed me with one of the most memorable evenings of my life. One that I will cherish forever.

Soon after Al, I received another phone call. This time, I was asked to fly around the world to headline the 2006 Broadbeach Blues Festival in Australia. A seventeen hour flight that almost killed me but I made it standing up only to stay in Australia for three days and then come back home to a weary wife and four kids.

The weary wife and four kids was a reality that an almost 40 year old man had to come to grips with. I was torn between two worlds. One of which seemed a bit more stable but it was hard to stand at those crossroads staring at a corporate world on one side and a world of music down the other.

And so the story goes…I hung up the music and went down the corporate road. Or as corporate as I'll let myself get anyway. A father and a husband first was the path I chose which left me with no regrets and a very full cake.

And the best part is the music is still the icing every now and then.

May I Have a Pecan Log Please?

Each summer, we travel to Georgia to the beach with family. Enjoying a tradition from my wife's side of the family, we are all able to leave the real world behind and take in the sun and sand.

This year and in keeping with our tradition of walking each morning, something my wife and I try to do as it provides a small break from the kids, we headed out and up the street towards the beach.

It was really early this particular morning and my wife suggested we take a walk on the beach. We hit the sand and began walking as the sun rose slowly above the ocean and the gulls swarmed looking for their breakfast.

Within the distance, I saw what looked like a man sitting in a chair with his trusty dog by his side. As we got closer, I noticed he was much older and was smoking a cigar almost down to the nub so he must have been out there for a while. I told my wife that any man who would get out on the beach this early in the morning smoking a cigar had to be someone I should meet immediately.

We approached the man and while my wife paid attention to the dog, "Tyler, Texas" blurted out of the man's mouth and I was a little taken aback. He pointed at my shirt and I realized that I had worn a Stanley's Barbecue shirt on our walk which had Tyler, Texas on the front.

"I spent half my life in Tyler, Texas." said the old man. "You folks sure are odd about your liquor. When I was there back in the old days, you had to have a club membership for each place you wanted to get a drink. I'll bet I had a hundred memberships in my pocket at any given time."

As he pulled on the cigar, I asked, "What were you doing in Tyler?"

"I was in the construction business. I built Stuckey's up and down the interstate. Of course, that's when the interstates were all brand new so my job was to evaluate land and then build the buildings. I spent a lot of time in Tyler as it was in a good central location. And it was a nice town except the liquor thing."

In Tyler's defense, I quickly told him that we could now buy beer and wine in stores as the law just passed a few months ago. Not sure that this was much of a defense as he began to chuckle at my statement.

The wife glanced my way telling me it was time to get back to our walk. I stuck out my hand and said, "Well it was nice to meet you. My name is Edwin Holt."

"Well it was nice to meet you as well Edwin." said the old man. "My name is Bill Stuckey."

Walking away, I whispered to my wife, "No freakin' way."

This would begin the conversation down my childhood memory lane as Stuckey's was a big deal on any road trip with my mother. Pecan logs were like gold as well as all the other candy they offered.

Stuckey's began in Eastman, Georgia back in the 30's. Williamson S. Stuckey, Sr. had such a successful pecan harvest from his family's orchard that he offered a portion of his bounty for sale in a lean-to roadside shed. Florida-bound tourists traveling the two-lane Georgia 23 blacktop snapped up the flavorful pecans instantly, as gifts for friends and family and as succulent souvenirs of the agricultural south.
 
As the business continued to flourish, Mrs. Stuckey took to her kitchen and created a variety of homemade pecan candies. The rest, of course, is history.

In 1937, a new building went up in which candy became king. The crowning glory in a profusion of nut-based confections was the now-famous Pecan Log Roll in a size for every appetite and every budget. Restaurant service was added, other fancy foods were stocked, and a souvenir section was installed to cover every whim from rubber snakes to sea-shell ashtrays. Gasoline pumps were a logical addition - all of it tied together with the signature teal blue roof. Stuckey's had come to life, and a new era of roadside travel service was born.

Stuckey's are few and far between these days due to a corporate buy-out that happened back in the 70's. Now, with a Stuckey back at the helm and over 200 franchised locations on the interstate highways spanning 19 states from Pennsylvania to Florida in the east and to Arizona in the west, they're alive and thriving.

Peace out brothers and sisters. And remember, great brands are made from hard work and that great entrepreneurial spirit. Oh...and Pecan Logs!
 

From The Sidelines of Common Sense

It's been an unusual couple of weeks considering all the emotions that seem to be swarming around the Zimmerman and Martin case. Emotions can be a dangerous thing and for the most part, I've stayed on the sidelines watching this disastrous media and now racial frenzy.

I think emotions and race relations aside, my opinion on the matter is a bit more cut and dry than the rest of America and has very little to do with justice but just good old common sense.

There are two topics I would like to cover on this piece and they are:

1. Fear

2. Guns

First let's discuss fear. There will be very few women that can relate to this story as most women I know haven't really been in a knock down drag out physical fight. I'm sure there are a few of you perhaps but I'm talking about a down home outside the bar fight that involved fists flying.

It was in a summer of my high school years when a young man approached me outside of a club and before I could get two words out of my mouth, he hit me twice in the jaw. (Yes there was a woman involved.) It happened so fast that the rest of the fight was more or less a blur and I have no recollection of movement, what I was doing or any sense of coordination. I do remember grabbing him by the head and hitting him underneath but this only lasted until a bouncer came running out of the club and broke us up. Fear, anger and adrenaline managed to take over my entire body leaving me with little control of my own actions. All I could do was hold on and try not to fall down. It damn sure wasn't like what you see in the movies. You know, where the guy is some sort of martial arts expert and within three moves the bad guy has a broken leg and a dislocated jaw. This is the kind of crap the entertainment world feeds us as if two guys are actually in control and fighting is some sort of glorified art form. It isn't.

In consideration of fear, which will bring up another point of this piece, I'll tell you another story that everyone can relate to. A few years ago, I was in a drugstore on the corner of Mockingbird Lane and Central picking up a birthday card for my wife. I was in the back of the store where all the greeting cards were when yelling broke out up front. Looking around the greeting cards, I saw a man yelling and screaming at the clerk. "I'll kill all of you! You'll do what I say!" He was obviously homeless and raging back and forth at the counter which put the fear of God in all of us in the store. We had no idea what to do and I felt absolutely helpless with nothing to defend myself with. Then all of a sudden I heard screaming and the air became so thick with a burning sensation that I could barely see and breathe. Unbeknownst to me, the clerk had let go of an entire can of pepper spray and even though I was at least 20 yards away, it was all I could do to get the hell out of there. I can't imagine what the homeless man was feeling as he took it straight in the face.

My take on all of this, the case, Zimmerman and the Martin boy is that both of them were out of control due to their own emotions. And emotions like fear, anger and a good shot of adrenaline are a deadly combination when a gun is involved.

Which brings up Mr. Zimmerman as we're all supposed to believe that it's perfectly acceptable for an untrained guy to carry around a firearm. It's the American way right? Now before you go beating me down as some liberal who's against guns, think again. What rubs me the wrong way is our society is perfectly fine with giving a guy who has no training the responsibility of keeping the peace with a gun. And that's just plain stupid.

Some of you reading this may know a cop or a soldier. These men and women are trained to handle guns and under large amounts of stress. All the while controlling their fear and emotions and even trained, it's not easy. They suffer from all kinds of emotional damage if by chance duty leads them into taking another human being's life so to say it's fine to arm up a civilian would beg the question, are you really prepared to take another man's life?

The moral of this story lies within my own experience in the drugstore which is simple and most importantly, it works. There are several ways to render a man helpless without killing him. Pepper spray, mace and my new favorite, the taser.

So before you plan on pretending to be Joe Badass with a handgun, ask yourself this question. Am I really ready to kill another human being? And if not, what other alternatives are there that would aid in taking a man down.

Problem solved brothers and sisters.
 

Hans and Spätzle - The Shoe Spoon Novel

This particular blog post was something that started around five or six years ago. Back then, it was actually an email chain going back and forth between me and Julian Potter due to how funny we thought the image was that Wade Griffith, a photographer, had discovered. 

What started out as a few emails began to grow into a full length story written by me, Julian, David Brashier and David Allen, one of Dallas' finest creative directors.

I had forgotten all about it until I discovered it in some old files so here it is for your own reading pleasure.

The great thing about this piece is it's an open story so if you feel that you can add to the saga, please be my guest. I'll review your content and post it if I deem it worthy.

Enjoy the read...

 

 EDWIN HOLT:

Hans never made it to the front lines. Most days, he stayed in his very own bunker he dug using a shoe spoon in the back of his grandmother's yard. He was always good about keeping his legs clean shaven and wanted so much to meet all the other German soldiers.

His pet kitty, Mr. Whiskers, kept a close watch on him as Hans had been known to eat other small animals and Mr. Whiskers was in no mood to become a small meal. He spent his time atop the green helmet. A place he called home or as Hans liked to call it, "My Lookout Kitty."

JULIAN POTTER.:

Hans’ older brother, Spätzle was extremely jealous of Han's ability to dig with a shoe spoon.  Of course, Spatzle wasn’t his original name, but after their mother left, the boys’ dad (Arnulf) renamed his oldest after his favorite German delicacy.

Soon after, Arnulf disappeared.  Some say he went to live out his dream as captain of a shrimp boat…but most others feared a more notorious theory.

The boy’s grandmother took great care of the boys…she was a seemingly caring and kind person…but getting along in years…Her only rule was to NEVER enter the room on the third floor – she called it the “knitting room”

One day while both of the boys were playing in the bunker, Mr. Whiskers inexplicably left his helmet and ran into grandmother’s house…straight up to the third floor.

The boys ran after him, and despite grandmother’s warning, they entered the “knitting room”…what they saw when they opened the door…would change their lives…and perhaps the course of history…forever.

EDWIN HOLT:

The room was littered in documents with swastikas and empty make-up containers. As Hans looked around the room, there were numerous pictures of Adolph Hitler and Nazi memorabilia. Rows of German uniforms hung from a free standing rack in the room next to a full length mirror. Next to the mirror was what appeared to be a makeup sitting table lined with bright white bulbs. An array of brushes and small black mustaches were lined neatly on the make-up table while pictures of Adolph Hitler were taped to the mirror.

Looking closely at the pictures, Hans gasped in shock as all the pictures of Adolph exposed a very hefty chest. Obviously a women's chest of generous proportions. The head of Adolph Hitler on a 70 year old woman's body? Hans shrunk to the floor in disbelief.

As he held his hands over his head hoping that he would awake from a terrible nightmare, Mr. Whiskers screamed as the door swung open.

JULIAN POTTER:

It was Grandmother!  She had a furious look on her face…a grimace the boys had only seen once in their lives when she caught them trying to electrocute a frog with a car battery and her curling iron.

Grandmother, except for her generous sized chest, had always been a masculine looking woman…strong chin…excessive facial hair…larger than normal adam’s apple.  The boys were petrified with fear.  Poor Han’s actually wet his pants, which was not uncommon because of the strict diet of apple sauce and sour kraut that was demanded by his grandmother.  Spatzle however, was allowed to eat whatever he wanted…another point of contention between the boys.

Besides being frightened, the boys were confused.  Growing up they had heard a spectrum of stories about Hitler…he was considered a monster by some…and a hero by others. They also heard that Hitler’s supposed death in the bunker may have been a farce…this was the main inspiration for Han’s obsession with digging bunker’s in the back yard with a shoe spoon.

Spatzle garnered up the courage to ask a question of his grandmother, although he suspected she would not tell the truth…”Grandmamma – did you know Adolph Hitler?  Are you Adolph Hitler?”  Grandma simply answered “No”…but the tale-tale signs of her deceit were evident – the boys had learned this over the years…her left eyelid would become uncontrollably twittery…and she became extremely flatulent.

As the foul air overcame the room, Grandmother told the boys “NEVER EVER come back to this room…and NEVER NEVER EVER tell anyone about this.”

The boys agreed, and ran from the room…they felt guilty…but they knew what they had to do….

DAVID BRASHIER:

The boys' plan was simple in concept, but fraught with complications as to its execution. They had decided that their grandmother had to be exposed to the world as either the somewhat gender-confused Hitler impersonator that they feared, or, even more horrifying, an actual gender-transmuted Hitler. Either way, the road ahead was a treacherous one.

Choosing the right media outlet for this task was imperative. They considered Geraldo, but were concerned that he might not have the necessary credibility after the whole "Al Capone's Vault" fiasco. Fox news was also a possibility. But would a cross dressing Hitler really stand out among the Bill O'Reilly's and Sean Hannity's that graced their airwaves? Not to mention the prospect of their grandma/fuhrer being given her own 30 minute time slot on Fox. What about CNN? MTV? TMZ? There was a veritable alphabet soup of possibilities.

Once an agreement had been reached, they decided to act before they lost their nerve. Hans soaked a rag with ether, careful not to stain his lederhosen. With a trembling hand and a rumbling in the pit of his stomach, Spatzle picked up the telephone.

DAVID ALLEN:

One ring. Two rings. Then, suddenly, a click of the receiver and a voice at the other end of the line that would chill every fiber of Spatzle’s being: “This is Harriet Goldfarb, how my I direct your call?”  Spatzle had meant to call the CIA, but in his haste had inexplicably dialed the JDL by mistake. Speechless, he  desperately groped for something, anything to say, until he blurted out the first thought that came to mind:

“Can you tell me where I might find a nice Pastrami on rye?”

The irony of the situation was not lost on Whiskers, who by now had overpowered the unsuspecting Hans, wresting the ether soaked cloth away from him. There was something about Whiskers that had always troubled the boys, something they couldn't quite put their finger on. There was the time their pet parakeet mysteriously disappeared. And other strange occurrences too: a bootleg mix of Cat Stevens inexplicably appearing on Hans's Wolkmon and an unsolicited VHS of Bye Bye Birdie arriving by parcel post with no return address. Unfortunately for the boys, they were never quite able to put zwei and zwei together.

As it turns out, Whiskers was no feline in the forest.  She had been around the litterbox a few times and when it came to counterintelligence, she was one Tidy Cat.

JOHN HINES, JR.

It wasn't like she'd intended to become a double-agent. Whiskers had started life with the intention of being a simple family pet in rural Kansas. Things had surely changed directions several times.

Her first "owner"--God, she hated that word--had been an eight year old girl, and they'd lived together on a farm in Hill City. Then she'd ended up living with a troupe of clowns, spending her nights sleeping in the glove box of their tiny car. After that, she'd moved to Pennsylvania, which is where she'd learned German and had been recruited as part of a network of couriers who could move around Europe without arousing suspicion.

That had been the life. One week, she would be living as the companion of a intermediate-end French prostitute. The next week, Whiskers would be on a train to Belgium, traveling with a salesman who dealt in clockwork marital aids. And then to Germany with the plastic surgeon pioneer who had perfected the first breast implant not made from wood. It had been he who had grafted the two tiny thumbs onto Whiskers' front paws.

The same front paws she was now using to hold the ether-soaked rag against Hans's nose and mouth. "Does this rag smell like ether to you?" she thought, smiling to herself at the joke as Hans lost consciousness and slumped to the floor.

All because of the invention of redial. If Spätzle had just dialed direct, instead of hitting redial on Whiskers's experimental Cat Phone, he wouldn't have known she'd been in touch with the JDL, and she wouldn't now be staring him down, trying to analyze his weaknesses and planning to kill him.

She didn't want him dead. They were on the same side, in fact. But, he'd possibly discovered her identity, and for that he must be silenced. She'd deal with the grandmother after she got the answer from the Home Office. First things first. 

Bound By Technology

Photo by Eli Chamberlin www.elichamberlin.com

Just the other day, I was reading an article about Stan Richards humbly attributing his success to the simple act of he and his staff getting to work on-time. I began to wonder about this statement as it pertains to the world we live in today and asked myself what does on-time really mean? Mr. Richards is referring to a very old school of thought where people clocked in and out each and every work day and enjoyed their own time as it was in the days of nine to five. Now that nine to five work day has never worked real well in the ad business so make that eight to whenever or even never going home in some instances when you're pitching an account or working some insane deadline.

As I began to ponder when my work day begins and ends, I was hit with the realization that it has exceeded any real boundaries. With my mobile phone helld (yes I meant to spell it that way) close to me at all times, I can't seem to get away from it. Texting, emailing, voice mail…the way we're all working and communicating seems endless.

There are some that will read this and think they unplug on their vacation. Really? I just saw all your pics on Facebook…have you really left the world behind?

I envy my father as he represents a generation that knew when and how to shut it all down. Throwing a bunch of guns or fishing rods in the back of that old green Pontiac, we would usually tail out on a Friday and come home late Saturday. No mobile communication which shames the now modern day me as I'm never without my mobile phone allowing it to interfere with my time and my family.

Think you're above the problem? Here are a few questions written by Daniel Sieberg who writes for the Washington Post which you may want to mull over.

1. Have you ever realized that you were texting or checking your email while your child was telling you about his or her day at school?

2. Have you ever felt that something hasn't really happened until you post it on Facebook?

3. Does a flashing red light or alert sound on your mobile device make your heart flutter?

4. Are you spending time with your spouse or significant other without talking to each other because you're each immersed in a different device?

If you answered yes to at least a couple of these questions, you're among the millions of Americans being overrun by technology.

Time acts differently as I've become older. I remember school seemed like it would never end and months seemed to drag on endlessly which is certainly not the case these days. Ten years ago feels like last week as I squeeze pants around an ever expanding waist line and struggle to focus on really tiny type. I'm almost in a state of shock with each school event I attend watching all of my boys slowly become young men.

As we all check our mobile devises and read endless emails, perhaps we should all wonder if Stan Richards had it right all along. His success may truly be attributed to getting to work on-time. And that time which is considered to be work time is exactly that. Which would mean that time spent away from work is not work at all but a blessing.

The blessing of time given to each one of us to unplug and enjoy.

Anticipation

It's been quite a while since I posted a piece. Fortunately, this is due to the amount of work that's been piling up as a glimmer of hope seems to shine underneath all the doom and gloom that has been casting such an atramentous shadow over our world.

And with all this work flowing into the firm these days, we decided it was about time to upgrade the computers which translated into long migrations, purchasing of new software and a lot of curse words.

While transferring files last week, I began the tedious effort of moving all of my music. A collection that has been underway since my twenties when CDs were invented. A product that made the purists cringe but gave way to the now digital age of music. Music transferred and listened to with the ease of a button.

If you are around my age, you have witnessed the greatest evolution in music that has ever taken place in our history. I don't think we as a society fully appreciate just how far it's come as we get so wrapped up within our own world, we lose site with where we were and how far we have taken this technology.

I can remember a night dad and I were watching television and a K-Tel advertisement came on promoting a new album. Rock Power featuring Stepping Wolf, Dr. John, Aretha Franklin, Gladys Knight and the Pips, and various other artists. It was indeed a power house of rock so we had to order it. I must have been around seven or eight years old and the anticipation of that thing coming in the mail was more than I could bare. We had both been punished with mom's albums of the Carpenters so anything aside from that or B.J. Thomas's Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head would be a welcome rebellious volume cranker.

High school would follow with cassette tapes. Now you could fast forward to your favorite song if you had the right kind of stereo in your car. A simple mechanism that would read the breaks between songs and stop before each number. No more clunky eight track players that were a crap shoot just finding what you wanted to hear.

I was in my college sophomore year when the CD came out. We couldn't buy them fast enough and the music companies couldn't remaster originals to keep up with demand. There was enormous paranoia with owning a CD player as we had all heard that the laser could blind you if the lid wasn't shut. A bunch of eighties kids being pushed into the future amazed at the shiny disks that held so much music. It was truly an amazing time for all of us who loved music.

And then it all went to hell in a hand basket with the computer, the internet and free music downloads.

As I transferred thousands of songs that have bounced from one computer to the next, I began to wonder where all the fun went. Where was that time when dad and I sat on the couch and ordered the soundtrack that would drive us down the road in his green Pontiac with the windows rolled down and seat belts buried out of sight without a care in the world. In fact, I was having trouble remembering the last time I actually bought a new album. I asked my wife if she had purchased a song or album recently and she couldn't remember either. This of course aroused my curiosity and the sociology bug began to bite raising the question if there were other folks like us.

Turns out…there are. And it's slowly killing the music industry.

According to a CNN article, total revenue from U.S. music sales and licensing plunged to $6.3 billion in 2009, according to Forrester Research. In 1999, that revenue figure topped $14.6 billion.

That's a big decline and those dollars represent a lot of hands within the world of music. Artists, musicians, producers, engineers, distributors and of course when was the last time you saw a record store? The article goes on to say it's due to the economy or free downloads but I think they are missing the mark. I think what's killing the music industry is the simple convenience of the internet itself. And you can define that as free downloads if you want but the fact is even as I type this blog, I'm listening to a station that I created myself that fits around my own tastes. A playlist that's tailored to fit around what I enjoy so why in the world would I want to buy anything? What's the point of that?

This is such a change from the old regular radio stations that either stuck to a commercial playlist or certain style of music that surrounds a target market. Not to mention the ownership of music with huge record albums that needed to be felt cleaned and dust tree, the eight track tapes that all had wrinkled labels due to a bleaching sun or a cassette tape that was recently eaten by an Alpine stereo that you picked out for the Trans-Am. 

And finally the CD that became so scratched it released a sort of du du du du du du du du du sound which you kept trying to clean with rubbing alcohol.

Is it good change? I can tell you the change doesn't sit well with the music industry but as a listener of music, I love what I'm able to do with the ease of a button. However, as a lover of music I miss the anticipation surrounding the release of a new album or song by one of my favorite artists. I miss times like the ones spent with my father ordering a K-Tel eight track tape loaded with legends of rock and roll.

I miss the Anticipation...

We can never know about the days to come
But we think about them anyway,
And I wonder if I'm really with you now
Or just chasin' after some finer day

Anticipation, anticipation
Is makin' me late
Is keepin' me waitin'

–Carly Simon

The Haunted Guitar

The resonator guitar, or Dobro as many musicians call it, might be the most haunting of all musical sounds. An eerie hollow twang that when played with a slide can easily lean on the blues or bluegrass.

Jerry Douglas from Warren, Ohio may be the most accomplished resonator guitar man who ever lived. Dubbed "Dobro's matchless contemporary master," by the New York Times, Jerry has been playing since the the age of eight, after his father—a steelworker who played bluegrass in his spare time—brought him to a Flatt and Scruggs concert, where he was entranced by the sound of Dobro player Josh Graves. After playing with his dad's group the West Virginia Travelers for several years, a 17-year-old Douglas joined the pioneering progressive-bluegrass band the Country Gentlemen in 1973. Two years later, he became a member of the seminal J.D. Crowe and the New South, which also included future solo stars Ricky Skaggs and Tony Rice.

The resonator guitar came about through a series of events which happened within the National String Instrument Company, which was formed in 1925 and co-owned by a Slovak immigrant family, the Dopyeras, along with several other investors.

The Dopyera brothers, of whom there were five—John, Robert, Rudolph (Rudy), Louis, and Emil (Ed)—were heavily involved in the National Company, both as inventors and
investors. Because of internal frictions with other parties within the company, John and his younger brother Rudy divested all their interest in National—including patents which they held for National instruments—and left the company in 1928. They had been working for some time outside the company on a new-style resonator assembly, which they were quick to patent upon their departure from National. The result of this new invention is the resonator guitar as we know it today.

The resonator is primarily played within two styles of music, blues and bluegrass. Both of which use a slide to create the sounds that are so haunting.

Bluegrass slide is played on top much like a steel guitar. The strings are raised to accommodate the weight of a heavier slide while the blues guitar is played much like a regular guitar with open tuning. I'm sure this all sounds musically technical so the best way to show you the music is to let you listen to it.

The first video is that of Jerry Douglas. I featured him in the third video as well due to his new album, Traveler, just being released which features Eric Clapton, Marc Cohn, Alison Krauss and Union Station, Keb Mo, Mumford & Sons and Paul Simon. The video features Mumford & Sons with their new release of The Boxer.

The second video is of my favorite blues man himself, Lucky Peterson. It's a grinding slide that will make you pull from a whisky bottle if you're not careful.

And I'm never careful so enjoy the music!

I Saw The Light

Telling this story has been an internal struggle for the last couple of months. I suppose the reason being is it's not my story and it was told to me in confidence so many years ago. However, due to the world today and what I see as a society of folks that have either misplaced or lost God all together, I thought it most appropriate.

Generally what I see in most instances are folks with a real lack of understanding and knowing. Given how fast everything is within this digital world we have all become so accustomed to, there is very little time spent just being still. And to know as well as understand God, you have to be still. Not to mention quiet.

With this in mind and given I have decided to let loose this story, some preliminary color for background is in order.

When I was little, probably around twelve or so, we lived with my grandmother. My mother, father and younger sister all lived in the same house my father was raised in along with my grandmother who lived on the other side of the house within her own quarters.

Attending Saint Luke's Methodist Church every Sunday, my grandmother met a man by the name of Lon T. Little. They fell in love and she decided to marry at what most would consider to be a very late age in life. I had never had a living grandfather before so I was excited with this prospect.

Lon, by all accounts, was a simple man and to appreciate this story you must understand this. He was kind, generous and one of the most loving people I have ever known. There was absolutely no presence of selfishness and if I had to label the man, he was truly a saint. And if you knew my grandmother, one would have to be just to live with her. I loved my grandmother but I can tell you it was all black and white. You colored outside her lines and all hell would break loose.

Lon and I became extremely close which I always thought was unusual given we weren't related nor did I have anything in common with the man. As mentioned, he was simple and could be quite child like at times. For instance, he was a Family Circle cartoon guy and I was more of a Far Side cartoon guy if that helps give some perspective.

Most of the time spent with Lon was under his direction in the yard. I helped build fences, shape his shrubs, plant flowers and tend to his garden. Later in my teens, I had become old enough to drive which meant lots of odd jobs under his strict direction.

I don't know why he shared this particular story with me. Possibly because he was getting older and felt that he needed to give it to someone. I've always kept the story to myself as I just never have felt like telling it. Not to mention it started out with and I quote, "You won't believe this but..." so you can just imagine what he was feeling when he let it loose.

So without further ado, here we go...

Lon was born and raised in the hills of Arkansas. He came from a very modest farming background raising everything that would wind up on the family's kitchen table. Other items grown or made were taken into town and sold for money which would pay for coffee beans, dry goods, materials, tools, clothes, shoes, etc...

If you were to classify his family at that time, I suppose you could say that he came from very poor conditions. I never got that from him though as to me, he was just a hard worker and always appreciative of what he had. He literally had two speeds which were work and rest which made for some interesting work experiences for me. He wasn't much on breaks or sitting around.

During harvest time in October of 1929, the world came to an end. Or at least America thought it did as the Great Depression swept a hand of poverty across our nation stripping money away from just about everyone. Our country became lost and drowning in hopelessness losing all direction and faith within our own economy as well as the elected leadership. Let me know if all of this sounds familiar but I always say there's no comparison when in a downed economy you still see people with Starbucks coffee.

With no where to turn for money, panic soon struck a young Lon Little and he became extremely concerned with the future of his family. As the thirties rolled around, nothing was getting any better. They could still farm but no one could afford to buy anything and without money, there were too many holes to fill when it came to running a farm.

Lost and afraid, Lon stumbled into his own barn and dropped to his knees. Trembling in fear, he quietly asked God what was to become of his family. This question was answered by what Lon described to me as a light. It began outside of the barn and streamed through the cracks of the wood until finally filling up the entire structure. In his words, the light was actually inside the room and prevented him from seeing due to how bright it was. This was followed by warmth throughout his entire body which he interpreted as inner peace. A peace in knowing that everything was going to work out and his own worries were pointless.

And as the story goes, the world would mend and Lon would travel through a very robust life with a wife, children, grandchildren and even a couple of step grandchildren he managed to inherit.

For many of us who never stop long enough to seek guidance or look for answers in the quiet of our own surroundings, we will never be relieved from the woes of this world. Using this story for guidance, how unbelievable it may be for some of you, I would advise finding a good barn to crawl into. You never know what kind of light may shine through the darkest of places.

In his memory and given he loved music more than anything...this one is for Lon. God bless you my friend and assuming where you are today, I hope you found some good sunglasses.

The Invisible World

I had a conversation with a guy the other day about video games and his belief was that our youth today live in a fantasy world. They are spending so much time in an invisible world that they are helpless in the real world. They don't know how to change a tire. They don't know where the oil goes in the car. They very rarely leave the house as this would mean leaving their invisible world behind. A world where having enough ammunition is the only priority.

For me, my own home is war room central. In fact, one of the funniest moments I remember from our very own fraternity house environment was a day where all four boys were sitting on the couch watching their big brother wheel the controls of a new war game. It was during  the summer months a few years back and we had been on him about taking Drivers Ed but he had been putting it off and putting it off. It finally got to be a big joke around the house as most of his friends were driving but for some reason he just wasn't in that big of a hurry.

One of the challenges within the game is to drive an army jeep around which seemed to be a problem as he kept driving into a fence or the surrounding forest. I was watching along with all the other boys and said, "Man, you're having a time with that jeep." My youngest, who was only six years old at the time, slid the comment out of the corner of his mouth, "That's because he still doesn't have a driver's license." This of course resulted in loud laughter from all of us sitting on the couch while cutting big brother completely in half.

Growing up in the country, we didn't have anything like this. Video games didn't really surface until I was around thirteen or so but it meant hanging around the convenient store with a pocket full of quarters and that held our attention for about thirty minutes tops. Not like today where kids are playing three to four hour runs pausing only for bathroom breaks.

If you want my opinion, I think that if you let your kid play that long it only shows your disinterest in his or her life. It shows that the parent is willing to allow their child to spend time with a game rather than themselves. And I'm just as guilty with this as sometimes it's just easier. You're tired, you've been working all day and your thinking is as long as they aren't bothering you about whatever it is, then life is just fine.

Well let me tell you...it isn't. 

I'm faced with a kid leaving for college and in my mind, the time I spent with him will never be enough. This could be just the way it is even if you spent every waking moment with them but I can't believe I'm actually staring college in the face.

What I'm trying to say in this endless ramble is that your kid is yours to spend time with so don't let a game rob you of your own time. The time that God blessed you with that slips by so fast that one day you wake up and you're staring at size twelve shoes as they walk out the door.

Video games, like a lot of things, are fine in moderation. Too much of anything is not good. That is unless it's time with your own child and there can never be enough of that.

Anthony John Valentino

I had one of those days this week that managed to intertwine a remark with some lost memories and made me stop and think about things. About myself. About the folks I work for and what they may think of me. It was one of those instances where I had to sit down as my mind began to roam all the way back to my childhood. But that's getting ahead of the story.

I was on a shoot Wednesday and during an interview process with the subject, one of the questions led into customer service. My client made a remark that stuck with me all the way back to East Texas as it was one of those statements that required some deep reflecting.

His statement to the best of my recollection was, "If you know who you are doing business with and understand who they are as a person as well as hold their character to a higher standard then you really don't mind paying more for their services."

By the time I got home, I was tired. It had been a long day in Dallas and the Holiday Inn didn't offer a whole lot of comfort the night before. After a quick hello to the family, I went to the bathroom and began emptying out my pockets. Wallet, iPhone, keys and then some loose change which I offered to the small leather container my wife had gotten me to hold all of my crap. When I looked in the container, there was a small knife laying in the middle of all those nickels and dimes and I picked it up remembering where I had gotten it so many years ago. That knife would be the very last piece of hardware my dad purchased for me at Tony's Sporting Goods Store in Longview, Texas.

When I was really little, my dad would take me to Longview once a month to get our hair cut. I hated the lady that cut my hair as she brushed my head too hard and it hurt. But this was always made well again by a promising visit to the one and only Tony's Sporting Goods Store where dreams could come true and if you've been good, Tony might find something special to put in your pocket.

Born Anthony John Valentino on April 25th, 1923, he was known simply as Tony. An enormous "How are you doing today my fine Doctor?" when my dad and I would enter the store will be forever engrained within my mind. He was one of those characters that could literally light up the darkest of rooms with just his spirit and charm. He knew no stranger.

Tony was born in Chicago, Illinois to John and Frances Valentino and joined the military in 1942. He served in the U.S. Marine Corps until 1951 with the 2nd Brigade during World War II. Gunny Sgt. Valentino was an ordnance supply chief and lineman.

On October 21, 1943, he married the love of his life, Margery Hunt. They were married in Washington, D.C.

In 1953, he opened Tony's Sporting Goods on Mobberly Avenue where he served his community for more than 50 years. He was a local U.S. Marine chaplain in his later years transporting vets to appointments in Shreveport.

Tony passed away on February 4th, 2007.

Thinking back on that statement from earlier in the day, I began to think about Tony and my dad. My dad could have gone to a big chain store where he could have gotten things cheaper. In fact, we could have gone anywhere but we didn't as Dad always made it a point to buy from Tony. Not because he was the best deal in town but because of who he was and what he meant to the community.

These are the things to take with you in this world. You do business with a man because of who he is and what he stands for. He may not be the cheapest in town but what you buy from someone like Tony doesn't ever stop with just the purchased goods. It's an investment in your life and I've always found that a good investment will bring a great return.

God bless you Tony. Your memory lives on forever in these woods.

New York - The Cultural Capital of America?

New York has long been considered the cultural capital of America. 
Is it still? If not, where?

This is a very vague question as it really doesn't define what kind of culture we're talking about so to help, I'm going to put my hands around some different topics as they pertain to what I consider to be culture as well as what effects the growth of fine arts.

Before I begin, I think it might be a good idea to define the word culture so here is what Wikipedia has to say about it.

Culture (Latin: cultura, lit. "cultivation")[1] is a term that has many different inter-related meanings. However, the word "culture" is most commonly used in three basic senses:

1. Excellence of taste in fine arts and humanities, also known as high culture
2. An integrated pattern of human knowledge, belief, and behavior that depends upon the capacity for symbolic thought and social learning 
3. The set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterizes an institution, organization, or group

Now I've got a real bee in my bonnet when it comes to favoring New York over the rest of the world. You can chalk it up to sheer Texas pride but I wear it on my sleeve like a Southern Baptist going to church. A few years back, the NASHER would open in Dallas and Ray Nasher went all the way to New York to get the logo and corporate branding developed as in his mind, the best always comes from New York. The account would come up for review some time after that and I was invited to the table where I sat with Mr. Nasher and pitched our services. And as much as it pained me at the time, they decided to go with another smaller firm. I was happy, however, to discover the smaller firm he selected was in Dallas which gave me some confort in knowing we've got folks down here that are just as creative or more so than what you might find in the Big Apple.

So why New York? What's so special about this place that it defines a belief of higher culture and continues to lead the world within this space? Well that's an easy question and it's better explained through an example.

When I graduated from college over twenty years ago, a cultural movement began in Dallas to restore Deep Ellum and create an arts district of sorts housing fine dining and music venues. In fact, my first real design job out of college was to design the logo for Trees which was an incredible music venue. Over time, Deep Ellum would lose it's luster and slowly die away leaving only a few places that might still feature music but the majority of the area is fairly well boarded up and they tell me it may be in some sort of transitional state to become more residential.

Meanwhile in Austin, 6th street thrives full throttle with great food and incredible music. A hub for real artistic expression with packed houses and busy bar keeps that can barely keep up the pace of set ups and beer taps while guitar slingers play on into the night.

So what's the difference?

Unlike Dallas, Austin has a set market that feeds the arts scene regularly, that being the University of Texas. You could consider this to be the meat and potatoes of cash flow while tourists provide the icing on the cake as UT has the fifth-largest single-campus enrollment in the nation and had the largest enrollment in the country from 1997 to 2003 with over 50,000 undergraduate and graduate students combined. That's a lot of kids with credit cards.

Dallas, on the other hand, is what I would define as a family city. Made up primarily of young people who are either single professionals or married with small children working 9 hour days. Southern Methodist University averages around 12,000 students which is hard to pull from consistently due to such a small number. A night out on the town is a hard sell when you're working so much or tending to the needs of your children.

So where does that leave us?

With the money flowing so well in support of the arts within Austin, artists flock to an environment where they can flourish and grow. And New York is really no exception to this as they have simply done a better job of pushing, promoting, nurturing and appreciating the arts over the years. That is not to say that they have better arts as they don't. I would put Jaap van Zweden, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra or the Nasher Sculpture Center up against any single one arts organization in the world and the Dallas Arts District, although still in development, will surely surpass expectations. Texas is full of top tier talent that continues to raise the bar of fine arts and culture and I will continue to beat the drum of my southern roots until they lay me in the ground. Boots and all.

In conclusion, does this rant or ramble actually answer the question above? Is New York still the culture capital of the world? If the question is based upon development, then I would say yes but only because of the money, the influence and passion that New York has always had towards building upon the arts and culture.

Do they have better artists or better culture? My answer is no they do not. Most creative people that live in New York are transplants that have moved there to further their career. It's the old, "If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere" that drives folks to the
North in search of growth and glorious careers.

But all that glory will never surpass our women, our music, our art, our barbecue and our rebellious nature to make a square peg fit through a round hole. That said, I'll keep the Texas dirt under my feet. You can send the Big Apple down here to me as I've got a real good cobbler recipe.

Julio's Corn Tortilla Chips

Let's face it, corn tortilla chips are boring. My wife has been buying Tostitos for years and only because we all need something to put the hot sauce on. I just can't imagine pulling out a bag of tortilla chips and eating them straight with nothing on them. That is until now.

FRESH had one of those sample people giving out free food and one of the items they were pushing was chips. Well you know how it is as you kind of feel sorry for those people out there all by themselves with their little table of food. It's kind of like a kid selling lemonade so you stop and try whatever it is their pushing as you don't want to look like a jackass. I can tell you with all the honesty left in my body that the chip given to me was the best tortilla chip I've ever had. And more importantly, it was great just by itself.

Julio's Corn Tortilla Chip is not only a great product but a great American story. And it's one of those stories that we should all take notice of when so many people have their hand out looking for a free ride.

Julio T. Garcia was born in Crystal City, Texas but raised on the other side of the border in Ciudad Acuña, Mexico. He worked as a cook at Del Rio Restaurant and had developed his own spices that he used on steaks. Del Rio closed down leaving Julio unemployed and in a sea of debt. He tried marketing his spices from home but his credit was so bad that no bank would give him the time of day.

And then a miracle happened.

One day, a woman came to his house asking about the chips they served at Del Rio and wanted them for a party. Julio cut up some tortillas, fried them up, applied his spices and the rest is history. From that day forward, people started showing up at his door wanting chips.

Now with eight employees in his garage, Julio is distributing his chips all over Texas. Wal-mart is even selling them now as 8 distributors pick up the chips and take them to San Angelo, Midland, Odessa and Abilene.

Julio T. Garcia serves as an example to all of us that if you are willing to work in this country, you can do great things. And speaking of great, these chips are the best damn tortilla chips I've ever had.

And you can bank on that statement.

The Loss of Privacy

The other day, a great friend of mine who sells real estate in Tyler asked me how Facebook makes money as well as questioned their value. It's a great question as most people don't understand just how valuable they are individually when it comes to their habits, tastes, gender and all the other data that they have so effortlessly entered into a company they know very little about. Or more importantly, what these companies are doing with this information.

Most if not all of you have opened an account with Google, Facebook or some other on-line service. In doing so, you are asked to approve of their terms and conditions and all of us simply accept this agreement without reading any of it. However, if you had taken the time to review the document you so lackadaisically approved of, you would have read that you now have relinquished any and all of your rights to privacy by giving your information to the company that's taking it.

So what does this mean about the value of Facebook and how can they use this information once they have it tucked away so nice and neat within their database? This is the topic of Joseph Turow's new book entitled The Daily You which takes a hard look at how the new advertising industry is defining your identity and your worth.

Within the book, Mr. Turow explains how the internet is often hyped as a means to enhanced consumer power: a hypercustomized media world where individuals exercise unprecedented control over what they see and do. That is the scenario media guru Nicholas Negroponte predicted in the 1990s, with his hypothetical online newspaper The Daily Me—and it is one we experience now in daily ways. But, as media expert Joseph Turow shows, the customized media environment we inhabit today reflects diminished consumer power. Not only ads and discounts but even news and entertainment are being customized by newly powerful media agencies on the basis of data we don’t know they are collecting and individualized profiles we don’t know we have. Little is known about this new industry: how is this data being collected and analyzed? And how are our profiles created and used? How do you know if you have been identified as a “target” or “waste” or placed in one of the industry’s finer-grained marketing niches? Are you, for example, a Socially Liberal Organic Eater, a Diabetic Individual in the Household, or Single City Struggler? And, if so, how does that affect what you see and do online?

Now that's a whole lot of information so let me dress that down for you. By the way, I pulled that off of Amazon's overview so I can't claim to have written it but I didn't see a need in rewriting it either. But what it essentially means is that corporations can and are buying your information for digital stealth marketing. The Obama administration, for example, is one of the most progressive on-line marketers in political history to date. They are taking it, buying it and will do whatever they want with it in massive efforts to market themselves within all digital platforms. It may be the biggest digital marketing effort I've ever seen by any single one organization backed by what's expected to exceed one billion dollars in funding.

Still lost on all of this? Let's say you're interested in golf and you have a Google account. Every time you search for golfing topics or products, Google tracks it and files it within their data base. This information is stored and combed through for potential targeting. If I'm a company and I sell golf clubs, I can purchase this information and have Google target you specifically by generating dynamic digital banner ads where you might like to spend time. For instance, Youtube was purchased by Google so every video you watch is tracked and stored for future marketing efforts. Watching videos to work on your golf swing and bam I've got you. Notice if you search for certain things within this application that the banner ads that show up tie into your interests. The same goes for Facebook as all ads on your page are specific to your tastes and preferences.

Turning the pages through this first chapter of our digital history that we all seem to be clicking through is a cautious tale. It is one that we should approach with thoughtfulness and take heed if we enjoy our anonymity. Remember, you and your interests are worth a great deal.

Especially to guys like me.