Friday, February 23, 2007

I live in the Third State. Years ago, I lived out in the Forty-Eighth State. These days I am firmly entrenched living here in number three. Both the third and forty-eighth are unique and could not be more different from each other. I live in quirky New Jersey. A place where some things have been preserved and frozen in time. It is also a place where other things have spoiled after slowly thawing for many years.

A couple of weeks ago I was Googling around and surfed across some information about one of my favorite music artists, John Cale. As I read, I learned that John Cale had recently produced an album for another similar obscure artist named Alejandro Escovedo. I have heard of Alejandro Escovedo but I don't have any of his material. I remember that there had been a movement by many artists to hold benefits to raise money to pay for Escovedo's fight against hepatitis.

So, I went to AE's web-page to see if he was coming to the area anytime. I felt that maybe, just maybe, New York City resident John Cale would be at one of his near bye gigs and I could rub shoulders with him. Some years back I had the pleasure of attending a John Cale concert and to my delight, I got to meet David Byrne. He was just there in the audience in a non-descript manner just looking like a regular guy.

As I examined his touring schedule, I was delighted to learn that he was going to be performing in near bye Montclair, New Jersey. It’s not too far away from my home and easily negotiable regarding car traffic. I checked a little further and learned that he would be performing at a church. A Unitarian church. I read a little further and learned that I can purchase tickets today....at a small mom-and-pop independent pharmacy in Montclair. An establishment named "Keil's".

I hopped in the car and drove 30 miles over to this unusual place. Unusual it was. It was almost like a quintessential storybook drugstore of a bygone age. Almost, except that it had that Jersey edge. Everything you’d want from a small drugstore: grooming aides and toiletries, a pharmacist, two elderly ladies at the counter, a magazine rack that included the periodical "Weird New Jersey", a greeting card area and trinkets for gifts. The establishment did not have that creamery fountain, as one would expect from that stereotypical vision. Instead of that, "Kiel’s" had a sandwich deli. Yes, a sandwich deli with a slicer, meats and cold soft drinks.

I felt that I was entering a special place when a little old lady who was leaving as I was entering, hit me with the aroma of her perfume. It immediately transported me to a vision of Wifey’s late grandmother. I remember that essence. Its name is "Charlie". I wondered if that was her ghost leaving the front door, because when I double-backed a few moments later to check her out a little closer, she was nowhere to be seen.

I bought two tickets to the performance and was compelled to purchase a sandwich at their deli, just because. I wasn’t even that hungry. I felt that I needed to take communion there.

Such is the stop-and-smell-the-roses nature of some things. Such is the way of some things New Jersey. New Jersey is more than big hair and Kabuki make-up by its young girls. It's more than what The Sopranos convey to the rest of the world. It's much more than what Bruce Springsteen can possibly sing about. It's above what snobbish, iconoclastic, wanna-be Manhattan residents, who belittle New Jersey from the confines of a twelve-by-twelve living area, could ever understand.

Oh yes it is. It is way more than that. The Garden State also happens to be a movie.

Tomorrow, Saturday the 24th, on The Independent Film Channel (IFC), "Garden State" starring Natalie Portman and Zack Braff will see the TV screen. This movie also stars one of my favorite character actors who generally portrays many people that I know: Peter Sarsgaard. Braff produced, directed and starred in this delightful and short on budget grass roots effort of his.

While this is one favorite movie of mine, it does a great job of not showing New Jersey in a pre-conceived manner. It shows how the protagonist goes back home to attend his mother's funeral, hooks up with a bevy of old high school chums and experiences life with those friends as if time has stopped for all of them. I can really relate to this and many of the players are people that I've known. I understand this reconnection thing. This picture touched me in a personal manner.

One brilliant aspect about "Garden State" is its soundtrack. It uses a couple of numbers from an equally brilliant band who hail from the 47th state. The name of the band are "The Shins". I love this group, I love their lyrics and I love their melodies. There is a point in the movie that Natalie Portman asks Zack Braff to, "listen to this song....it will change your life".

Recently, I have been fixated with "The Shins" and their one song that tells a story about life in high school in a very poetic manner. The name of the song is "Phantom Limb". There are a few passages in the lyrics that I believe only experience and living will allow you to understand. "Phantom Limb" was not part of the soundtrack to the movie, but is a song this is currently on a heavy rotation on alternative radio/college radio formatted stations out of the band’s most recent effort.

Let it be proclaimed that today, on the eve of the eve of The Academy Awards, JerryNJ awards "Kiels", "Alejandro Escovedo", the motion picture "Garden State" and the band "The Shins" the highest distinction possible by JerryNJ and this blog…….the inaugural "Golden Turnpike Award" for their exemplary contributions to New Jersey and the world.

Visit Keil's phamacy in Montclair:
http://www.keilspharmacy.com/

Check out Alejandro Escovedo's web-page. You can listen to some of his newest material. In the upper left corner when the streaming audio finishes loading, check out tune #2. It's called "Sacramento and Polk". A gritty number that cannot be played loud enough:
http://www.alejandroescovedo.com/

Learn about "The Shins" at their MySpace page and from a Wall Street Journal review. You can also listen to four of their numbers from their newest album here including "Phantom Limb":
http://www.myspace.com/theshins
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB117129983781306004-TmRTSYeIs6reCL8AoansHa7g9CY_20080214.html?mod=tff_main_tff_top
Lyrics: http://www.songmeanings.net/lyric.php?lid=3530822107858632003

Garden State movie reviews:
http://www.dallasobserver.com/2004-08-12/film/yes-you-can/
http://efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=8529&reviewer=128

John Cale:
http://www.john-cale.com/


Cheers.

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posted by JerryNJ @ 3:21 PM 0 comments

Thursday, February 01, 2007

I watched the State of The Union Address last week and watched as many hours of punditry afterwards just to get a better sense of what this bog-like quagmire in Iraq is turning into. I've also digested the news reports in the last week since the President's speech.

What I've come to wrap in a nutshell is that no amount of troops that the "coalition" forces send to Iraq can possibly curb ones' desire to kill themselves and take as many people with them when they do that. Disenfranchise a human being to a point that life is not worth living, and you can mold an individual into one who is very dangerous to others.

It can happen everywhere in civilized society. In the United States, for instance, if one disenfranchises a postal worker, guess what happens?

Send millions of more soldiers to Iraq, it will not make a difference. To some of these iconoclastic non-secular radical neo-luddites, to kill one’s self is like trying to get them to stop breathing. I believe it cannot be done right now. No one can stop anyone from a suicide bomber if they have the explosives and means to do so. And the death squads? What amount of soldiers can possibly curb that problem?

It is more and more evident that this "war" is the most unconventional conflict that this country has ever been in. Exponentially more unconventional than 'Nam. Unconventional circumstances require unconventional solutions.

So, to this end I propose two solutions.

One solution to curb suicide bombers is to be able to read such a person's mind. The solution lies in sending mentalists like John Edwards and Miss Cleo straight to Iraq to help the cause. I know that they'll hedge and claim that such types can only "channel" dead people. They can, however, "channel" the virgins that these suicidal dead-enders are being promised by their clergy.

Surely, one of these hucksters can claim to be able to reach at least one of the seventy virgins that these lemmings are being promised in the after-life. Or, perhaps he or she can pretend that he can.

Put John Edwards on TV and have that guy start some channeling with these seventy virgins and channel what they are saying. John Edwards would then channel babble like how these virgins are all 90 years old and incontinent. How God has taken all their vaginas away by plugging them shut. Then, perhaps brand an FBI agent a cleric and agree with John Edwards' visions. Put these two on Al-Jazeera and disseminate that disinformation onto the gullible hoards who inhabit these wastelands. This campaign could be buttressed by having Dionne Warwick do testimonials that she knows these asexual Arab virgins.

Suicide bomber problem solved without having to get into a bidding war with these clerics that The West can promise more virgins if these lemmings chose to remain alive instead.

My second solution: pull completely out of Iraq now and create a leadership vacuum. Allow the Iraqis hash it all out. When a leader emerges, and if that leader is not in-line with pragmatic modern secular non-violent ideals, well......America and another phony timid coalition country go in, blow everyone apart, and allow the process to start all over again.

The way that I see it, the American military machine is very very good at invading a country and ousting existing governments. Panama and Grenada come to mind. The first time around in Iraq, we were able to have Saddam surrender with approximately 300 soldiers' lives lost and about 500 wounded. American policy and its military are incapable of occupation, however. That is where the problem lies folks. Contrary to the American ideal of allowing market forces to settle prices, that particular discipline is ignored when it comes to nation building. Why?

Too cruel? Too inhumane to the civilian population? It would create a refugee problem for neighboring Arab countries?

Regrettably, the current administration of George Bush and the beehive of influence surrounding it, is not receptive to the unconventional. Not attuned for such out of the box attack strategies on Arab governments. It would require too much patience and too much articulate thought.

Take for instance this essay by Captain Peter Layton of The Royal Australian Air Force. He outlines the unconventionality:
http://www.usni.org/Proceedings/Articles03/prolayton03.htm

Any kind of fundamentalism, Islamic or Christian, stands to tip the worlds tender equilibrium. The clashing philosophies are readying a titanic showdown.

Offering these types a Coca-Cola is not going to stop their hate.

*!*

posted by JerryNJ @ 4:27 PM 0 comments