Mad. Mad World

Stop the world. I want to get off.

If one more thing happens before I try sleeping tonight, I think my brain will shut down. Are everyone's planets out of alignment at this moment in time or is it just mine?

Going to Sprout for dinner and a music show temporarily lulled me into thinking that the world was finally righting itself.

The chicken salad over mixed local greens with bacon vinaigrette was a savory marriage of flavors and full of greens I couldn't even identify (always a good thing). I thanked the two people who had recommended it to me.

And the music was strong tonight. Dogs on Main Street (really one dog named Mac) began with the folk classic "This Land is Your Land," a song I can remember singing in elementary school

Saying, "I felt like I lost a friend the past few weeks. This is for Clarence," he launched into a rousing cover of "Badlands."

He was clearly getting hot up there (as dogs do on steamy July nights) and cracked wise, "Is the air conditioning set on Mexico?" before wiping his face of accumulated sweat. Being hot, though, did not affect how good he sounded.

During the break, I saw a friend who a) told me that he and another musician are recording a Christmas album and b) asked me about Jane Goodall and her chimp for the sake of updating his status.

After a while, you don't ask why.

It was my second night in a row for The Great Unknown, so I got to hear a lot more songs as well as a full drum kit on the songs I'd heard last night.

At one point, the girl standing next to me turned to her friend and stage-whispered, "These guys are amazingly good. They're from Philly!" I couldn't tell if she thought the two were mutually exclusive.

Favorite lyric:
My window is half full of clouds and it's open
And I'm inviting the weather in

I totally get that. My windows are always open and the weather, like the sounds of train whistles and birds singing, come in unbidden, but not wholly unwelcome.

And the continuing weirdness I find awaiting me when I get home? That would be any number of e-mails from friends full of crazy content.

"Thumper's mother said if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all."

"I will stand semi-politely behind the youngsters that flock to you."

"You are looking at the latest job fatality. I am now a permanent woman of leisure."


"Just sitting here fantasizing about you in a pair of leather chaps. Wow, I must have one hell of an imagination to imagine that. Titillating nonetheless. "


[Sound of Head Exploding]