For the last month or so, I have fallen into a horrid, guilty-sin-pleasure habit… stopping at Denny’s to pick up dinner on the way home from late night shows…. It feels like I am crashing the party of drunkards and the dancers and 2am lovers on prom night… but I am perfectly hungry and spent at that hour, and it is a necessary evil… plus, in a way, it makes me feel like I am on tour… the traditional late night dinner after a show…

I always order the same thing… salmon and broccoli and a side salad to go… Brendan, who prides himself on eating salmon and broccoli in every country at the finest restaurants in the world, argues that this is utter blasphemy, that if you’re going to eat fish, you should always eat fish where they specialize in it… and where they serve it fresh… and that if you’re ever going to eat at Denny’s, you have to take the lowest risk possible…. that is, eat something that they cannot possibly mess up…. say, pancakes… or an egg… but my argument is that, salmon is fresh when they freeze it and it is better to eat something healthy in the middle of the night, than something unhealthy but still cooked well… the lesser of two evils…

The stoic, expressionless manager takes extra pride in his meals. Every single time, before sealing the order in to-go bags, he brings my food out in open boxes to show me his “creations.” It is sweet and caring and I always appreciate his careful attention and deliberate unveiling, as if he was lifting the curtain away from a priceless piece of art. He waits for my face of approval before closing the boxes, as if I might send it back to the kitchen if I am not completely satisfied or if I don’t show how excited I am by how awesome it looks…

After weeks of this tradition, last night the manager asked me, in his broken English/eastern Indian accent, “Why, sir… why do you all of the sudden always come here?”

I typically give vague answers to such “personal” questions about my private life, and I told him since they started the nightly freeway closures (for road repairs), he happens to be in my new detour route home from work.

He walked away to get my food, somewhat unsatisfied with my answer, then returned and curiously probed…

“This job… what is your job?”

“Well, I sing songs.”

His eyes lit up, and for the first time in weeks, he broke his wooden, emotionless face. “Ah, are you like Michael Bublé or Bruno Mars? You must be rich!”

I did not want to hurt his feelings, or shatter his sweet, innocent fantasy… but I explained that this is far from any possible reality…. and if I get to do what I love to do, then, I guess I am rich.

He was dumbfounded, and asked why this is not the case, why am I not rich… then proceeded to give me his expert, unsolicited advice.

“All you need to do is make one great song. A song that will touch people’s hearts and make them feel like crying. You do not need a whole album. Just make that one song.”

I was amazed at his wise words. So simple. So sage of him…. then raced home to get my banana split in the freezer before digging in to the healthiest meal I could find in the middle of the night…

Holy of holies… I got to see Butch and David play tonight… from the front… they’re back out with Lucinda Williams this month for a short Los Angeles tour (genius, actually, touring in one city). It occurred to me while I was busy getting hypnotized, this is the first time I’ve SEEN them playing, in years… that is, without my back to them… I thought it was quite a revelation… how I only really HEAR them, and rarely SEE them… plus, it was gigantically refreshing to get to enjoy a show without having to worry about any details or sound issues or getting tuned or anyone else’s experience but my own… a night to sit back and relax and not have to bother with anything… weightless… just enjoy… they are so dreamy…

Every year, my brother and his family make a 10 hour pilgrimage to get to Disneyland. It has been their annual tradition for years and years. The best part of it all, of course, is that I get to spend one of their days loving my nephews, riding rides, standing in lines, grading the rides, judging the “cast members,” discussing important life issues like who my favorite Avenger is… what would I do if there was no gravity… what kind of scientific discoveries we need to make to help mankind… It’s a big deal… and a giant blast… and I guess, now it has become MY annual tradition…

Today was our day, as well as Walt Disney’s birthday… near the end of the night, however, we missed whatever extra birthday celebration activities might have been going on, in exchange for riding Splash Mountain… I was extra proud of my brother for negotiating the deal so they would let us keep going around and around without having to get out of the floating log… we made it four times in a row… a real record… each time around, singing new harmonies with the robots and the Brear Rabbit Soul Singers… each time, scoring and rating the final drop into the water… it was a huge thrill for my nephews… and a painful, aching trauma for me, as I had to pee soooo bad… “Can you hold it one more time, Uncle Mikey??” “Come on, Uncle Mikey! Hold it!”

Afterwards, we bolted straight for the bathrooms… mostly in silence, and with a shared, unspoken bond from our newly-achieved, life record and the pressing urgent mission at hand…

Finally, while standing in the stall, releasing the pressure valve and letting it all out… I knew it was all worth it… the waiting and holding… for Walt on his birthday… for my awesome nephews… as I boldly exclaimed “Ahhhhh oohhhhhh urghhhaagghh, Uncle Mikey just released his own Splash Mountain!” and my nephews cheered with Disney delight at my magical pun…

My neighbor, apparently, can’t stop believin’ and loves Journey so much he needs to share it with the world. For two hours, he had to play his entire collection at full throttle decibels. I tried closing all my windows, but I couldn’t keep the sound out. For the first few songs, as each one ended, a little silence broke through as the track was changing. I kept opening my window and yelling, “Headphones, man! Use headphones!” but the pounding barrage of incoming soul poison kept pouring in to my house. When he ran out of his Journey, Bon Jovi came on and that was the straw that broke my camel’s back. This was too much punishment, and I broke down and called the police. I don’t mind confrontation and have had many face-offs or community building exchanges, but this particular neighbor has left me with a sense that he might be unstable – I am unfortunately privy to some of his life adventures, and know some things from his candid conversations with neighbors in the open air… and I know he owns a gun…

Within 7 minutes, the music stopped. I could hear the ocean again.

Later in the afternoon, my neighbor began tending his garden just outside my bedroom window. He started singing, as if it was to himself, but knowing my windows were wide open… “You should not have called the police, La la la” and “You should have come talked to me la la, f#$^%ing pussy, la la la.”

I’m not sure why he thought his message should be delivered in song, but more and more epithets spilled out of him in tuneless melodies… however, not tuneless enough to erase the damage that had been done. Some melodies take years and years to forget, and now I have to start all over with the recovery program.

I wanted to yell back at him that he was lucky he didn’t get hauled away in handcuffs for having bad taste or put away for violating me, a soul rape… he should get 10 years to life for that… there should be a Three Strikes law for playing bad music…

I have never had a personal encounter with (or a burning for) exhibitionism. Growing up, as a kid, I remember hearing stories of supposed trench coat flashers, and crazy streakers, and bizarre, cult nudist colonies… but in my whole life, I never witnessed any in action, first hand. The idea of someone exposing him or herself in public, maybe as an uncontrollable urge or necessary exciting thrill or act of artful expression… seemed like such a science fiction wonder to me.

This weekend, I took my usual stroll through the farmers market to refill my strawberry tank and perpetuate my addiction…. saw some of the same faces that I regularly see – the migrant entrepreneurs, the scary balloon clowns, the hobo buskers working their magic on the people….

All the strange sun and familiar ocean air and wind beating the boats’ sails in the distance… along with the plates and plates of freshly cut samples stabbed with toothpicks… it’s easy to get hypnotized… reminiscing about all the outdoor souks and otherworldly barker’s voodoo that I miss so dearly…

By the time I finally got home, I was exhausted and happily filled with my dose of open air and social interaction…

I unloaded the watermelon and strawberry pallet, along with the bundled clumps of fresh mint … kicked off my shoes… locked up the car… headed back in to the house… when all of the sudden, as I started to unbutton my shirt and peel it away… I looked down… to find… that my important zipper had been UN-zipped the entire morning…

Not that it’s such a horrible thing (and maybe the ocean air is the true elixir and secret fountain of youth)… but this is the third time this has happened to me in the last week and a half… completely unintentional and unplanned… and each time, I have to retrace my steps in my head, wondering who I might have passed or if anyone could have possibly noticed…

I want to believe this is not the beginning stages or early signs of dementia or of me losing my mind… but rather, simply another example of my carefree, hippy state of being…. so lost in thought and dreams that I can’t be bothered by such minor details… I keep telling myself it’s more evidence that I am a true free soul, living free and detached from the constraints of normal daily drudgery and even time itself… untethered from the conventional ways of the world. Right on, brother, right on.

Commando for the people…