Entertainment Ave!

By:

The Dude on the Right
In the immortal words of Nanga Eboko, exchange student from Cameroon, "Merry New
Year!!!!!!"  Sure, it’s a few days early, but I doubt I’ll be doing a blog
on New Year’s Eve night, even though I really don’t have anything planned
except, thanks to the NFL, watching the Chicago Bears play the Green Bay Packers
in what a lot of people say might be
Brett
Favre’s last game.  Thankfully our local radio station pops a little
delay on the broadcast and it synchs with the cable TV broadcast so rather than
hear John Madden wax poetic during the entire broadcast that this might be Brett
Favre’s last game, I’ll get to yell "Ball" with

Tom Thayer of the WBBM broadcast team (along with Jeff Joniak) every time
there is a fumble.

But yelling "Ball" at the TV screen is the least of my
worries, right now, because I think I am suffering from reality TV withdrawal. 
My main symptom of my malady – multiple dreams in one night of me in reality TV
shows.  The scarier part?  They weren’t even real TV shows.

In my
first dream last night I found myself in a sort of "military boot camp" reality
TV show.  I was in a big room, with a lot of people I didn’t know, and all
of us were dreading the "training" we were going to have to endure.  I
wanted to quit before the filming even got started, but as dreams sometimes take
a life of their own, all of a sudden this one turned into something about one of
the dudes swinging the driver from his golf bag around, as we all started
ducking for cover, and me wishing I had brought my golf clubs so I would have a
weapon, only I kept knocking over other golf bags before realizing I did bring
my clubs, but I woke up before I could pull out my driver and join in the fight.

So I woke up, drained the main vein, and headed back to sleep wondering "What
the hell was that?"  And no sooner do I remember that than I kicked into a
dream even more all over the place.

It started at a basketball court, where
the players seemed to be committing a lot of hard fouls (this might have been
spurred by the news coverage of the Chicago Bulls’ player that got hurt the
night before), one that even took Joakim Noah (although he wasn’t in a Florida
Gator’s uniform) to the floor where he broke his arm and dislocated his shoulder
and kept rolling around and screaming while his arm flopped around like a fish
out of water and it took most of his teammates to get him to stay still so as
not to hurt himself any more than he already was.  At this time me and my
buddy (even though I didn’t know who he was) were on the court watching this
happen when a security guard escorted us outside, where we kept insisting to let
us watch the rest of the game and that we wouldn’t go on the court, but he kept
saying we were needed for something outside.

So there we were, and then a big
group began to congregate, complete with buddies I knew, namely The Dude on the
Left, Aquaman, and Big Cooter, and they wouldn’t stop talking amongst
themselves.  We found ourselves being separated into two football teams,
only I didn’t hear my name called the first time and had to run through the
crowd when our jerseys were being handed out, in total fear I was going to be
yelled at by our coach for not hearing my name the first time.  But joining
with my team proved just as daunting as my friends wouldn’t shut up and I feared
us getting yelled at (I suppose that sort of reminds me of a night class I had
in college when T.P.’s friend decided to join us for class), and with their
talking I couldn’t hear what our "coach" was saying.

But that didn’t fluster
me as much as trying to put on my jersey.  For whatever reason there were
pads on the inside of the jersey, and it was a couple of sizes too small, so I
kept trying to stretch one arm open a little more to get one arm in…

And
then, wouldn’t you know, my phone rings, waking me up as I struggled to get my
jersey on, AND IT WAS THE WRONG FREAKIN’ NUMBER!

So now I won’t really know
why I was supposed to be in a "military boot camp" nor a "weird football game"
reality show.  But what really bummed me out the most, after I woke up, was
that I wasn’t able to flip the switch while I was dreaming, to realize I was
dreaming, and take control of the dream.  That is the coolest thing about
my dreaming when I can make it happen.

So on this eve of the eve of New Year’s
Eve, for Joakim Noah’s sake, I hope my dreams aren’t premonitions.

And if my
dreams are premonitions, all I ask if for one of them to give me the winning
numbers for the lottery.  Is that too much to ask for the New Year?

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
The Godfather of Soul James Brown died, President Gerald Ford died, but who will
be #3, because deaths come in three’s, right?  My guess is Saddam Hussein. 
Anyway, thanks to the grand opening of the
House of Blues in Chicago I have a James Brown story for this podcast, and it
goes along with the picture posted here.  Staff member, The Mystery Dude,
also reviewed that show we saw back in

November of 1996.

But this podcast isn’t only about death, it’s also about
things like why I will never buy a Kia vehicle, a rant about the NFL and their
network, and my debating whether or not to invite any of my friends to see my
Christmas display, mostly out of fear of ridicule about my window treatments.

But the most important thing about this podcast might be that I found the best
version of "O
Holy Night," ever, thanks to one of the bulletin boards that I read. 

I hope you are having an okay holiday season whatever you are celebrating, or
might not be celebrating.  If I get the gumption I might do another podcast
before the end of the year, but if not, good luck with picking your resolutions
that you will probably break during the first couple of weeks of the new year.

Thanks for
listening.

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
You know how the holidays are supposed to be about getting together with loved
ones, or at least your family?  Well, I think I’m done with that. 
It’s not that I don’t love my family, in fact my favorite nephew is, or should I
say was, so high up on the list that I offered to pick him up at the airport
(and on a quick side note, the airport in question was Cleveland Hopkins
International Airport, which I must say is a whole hell of a lot smaller than
Chicago’s O’Hare Airport).  And sure, I complained a bit about the fact
that his flight was getting in at 6:40 AM Cleveland time, which is 5:40 AM Dude
time, which means waking up at about 4:30 AM Dude time to pick him up, yet there
I was, at baggage claim #9.  There he was, all bright-eyed and bushy-tailed
as he was getting in from a red-eye from Las Vegas, so I let him nod off a bit
on the ride back to my folk’s house, and tried to keep quiet at home so he could
take a nap.

Now, in my preparation for coming home for the holidays, one of
our traditions is to see a movie on Christmas Day, but since I might be
traveling back to the dude-pad that day, I figured wouldn’t it be great to head
to the movies with my nephew on Friday evening, and maybe hit the bars
after,where he could give me the hip ways to pick up college dudettes these
days, and I could show him that his uncle has no right trying to pick up college
dudettes.  Oh, wait, he’s not 21 yet, but I did hold off on my seeing
"Rocky Balboa" before he showed up, thinking that would be our movie to catch
this weekend in pseudo-tradition for Christmas.

But alas, this afternoon, in
telling some of his exploits in Sin City, it came out that he had already seen
an aged Rocky try to re-claim his glory.

And so, figuring that, for a change,
I wouldn’t have to go to the movies alone, and remembering what our staff
member, Whammy, once said, "Only losers go and see movies alone," well it looks
like tomorrow I’ll be a loser.  At least my favorite niece might have been
fast thinking enough to lie about what movies she has seen so as not to ruin
Christmas Weekend.

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!