Bob Dylan at the Greek Theatre

I gave myself an early birthday present and spent last night with the hubby at the Greek Theatre seeing Bob Dylan. Although I've always been a fan, this was actually my first time seeing Dylan live in concert. Dylan did not disappoint.

The night started rather dicey. We had a bitch of a time finding parking. By the time we got in, all the seating that was left was up in the grassy knoll. The air was cold, the ground was hard, and I was wondering just what the hell I was thinking when I left the house without a coat. We had a neat view, though. We could see over the top of the stage structure onto the city lights of Berkeley.

Dylan and the band took the stage a little after the 7:30 stated start time. A rocking Gonna Change My Way Of Thinking let us know that this was going to be a good night. This was my favorite Bob Dylan - the bluesy rocking Dylan. Dylan was strong. He played and sang with amazing energy, especially considering the man is 68 for Pete's sake. The band was also strong. Charlie Sexton is back for this tour and his guitar has never sounded better. Dylan played guitar, keyboard, and harp. The best part was that he and the band really appeared to be having a good time. At the end of Highway 62 Revisited the hubby looked at me in amazement and said, "how old is this guy?" It was just so hard to believe that someone whose been in making music for 45 years could still be this rocking.

The crowd was great - at least where we were sitting. Now I don't know what was going on down in the seated section, but up on the grassy knoll folks were having a great time. I don't know if it's because of the type of crowd that Dylan attracts or the fact that many folks were lighting up, but everyone was friendly. There were no obnoxious loud talkers or drunk people acting like dickwads. It was just a lot of people having a good time.

Dylan and the band sang for 90 minutes straight - no idle chitchat bullshit...just 90 minutes of great music. They came back for a 3 song encore of Like a Rolling Stone, Jolene, and All Along the Watchtower. I like to hear artists do songs from their early careers because the interpretations seem a little different when the artist is older. I noticed that again last night when hearing Like a Rolling Stone. You see, Dylan has lived it now, so it sounds like sage advice from someone who's been there.

All in all, it was a great night. I heard some of my favorite songs and got to see a legend showing that he's still got it. (And thanks to all of people in our section who were lighting up. I don't light up myself, but I sure end up happier when people around me do.)

Here's the set list for the show. (Thanks to http://www.boblinks.com/)

Gonna Change My Way Of Thinking

The Man In Me

Beyond Here Lies Nothin'

Mama, You Been On My Mind

Tweedle Dee & Tweedle Dum

I Don't Believe You (She Acts Like We Never Have Met)

My Wife's Hometown

Spirit On The Water

Cold Irons Bound

The Lonesome Death Of Hattie Carroll

Highway 61 Revisited

I Feel A Change Comin' On

Thunder On The Mountain

Ballad Of A Thin Man

(encore)

Like A Rolling Stone

Jolene

All Along The Watchtower
--

And here's a little sample of what we heard - Jolene from the Seattle concert earlier this month.

Getting Pee from a Coyote

My son and I were chatting today and he told me about a friend who uses coyote pee to get rid of gophers. This of course led to the questions - where does one get coyote pee and just how do you get pee from a coyote? So I did what any enquiring mind would do - went to the internet to do a little research.

I was surprised to find internet sites that sell all kinds of animal urine. My favorite site was PredatorPee.com. I found the coyote pee I was looking for, as well as fox pee, mountion lion pee, bobcat pee, wolf pee, and skunk essence.

Now I'm a city girl, so I had no idea why people would want animal pee. Apparently it's used to keep away pests and train animals. If you have a problem with armadillos, wild boars, or javelinas, then mountain lion pee is for you. Just spray a little mountain lion pee around your garden and those unwanted critters will be too afraid to visit. My mom lives in Arizona and has trouble with javelinas tearing out her flowers. Guess what she's getting for Christmas now!!

Wolf pee apparently keeps away coyotes, moose, bear, elk and mule deer. Bobcat pee keeps out mice, moles, and other rodents. Fox pee can be used to keep away rabbits, squirrels, skunks, and "varmints". Coyote pee works on deer, raccoon, rats, fox, ground hogs, and iguanas...as well as the gopher.

You can also use this animal pee to teach dogs and cats the appropriate places where they can pee. To quote the PredatorPee author, "In the animal world, urine is the great communicator." (Insert gratuitous Ronald Reagan Great Communicator joke here.)

So now we know where to by the pee, but how does that pee make it into those little bottles? And just who does this kind of work? Now, I have a diabetic dog, so I'm used to running around catching his pee in a cup so we can test the sugar in his urine, but I can't imagine doing that to a bobcat...at least not without some serious alcohol intake. And doing this on a large enough scale to actually be able to sell worldwide, well that has to be pretty risky business.

My mind was working, trying to figure out just how to collect all of that pee from seemingly wild animals. Visions of Marlin Perkins and Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom went through my head. Marlin standing a good 500 feet away with a microphone, quietly narrating as Jim Fowler sneaks up on a bobcat, "Now, let's watch Jim trap the bobcat and extract its urine. It takes a steady hand to catherize a bobcat, especially when the bobcat isn't sedated, but we know Jim can do it."

Alas, the real collection isn't nearly as entertaining or dangerous. The urine is collected from zoo or other captive animals. The animal pees on the floor of the pen and the urine goes down a drain where it is then collected. Well that's just no fun at all, but who said that wild animal urine collection was going to be an exciting job.

So there we have it - animal urine. Who knew that is was so handy and so easily collected? Now if they ever find a marketable usage for regular housecat pee, I've got myself a whole new income source!

I'm a bad person, I admit it. Are you all happy now?

I try to minimize my contact with people. People make me feel bad, so it's best if I just try to stay away from them. Unfortunately, I do have to have some interaction with people...and this week it just hasn't been good. Aside from my students who all seem to want to blame me for their problems and tell me how unfair I am this week, I had this strange encounter at the pharmacy.

I went to the local Rite Aid to pick up some insulin needles for my diabetic dog. There were a couple of customers randomly standing around in different places, no one closer than about 5-8 feet from the counter. I just figured they were waiting for their prescriptions to be filled. That's what I do when I'm waiting and that's the way customers do it at the other pharmacy I use. So, seeing no one at the counter, I walked right up. The clerk wasn't there, she was dealing with something else. She finally saw me and came over to wait on me. As she's getting my order, some other woman who knew the clerk walked up to the counter and said to her "I hate people who cut in". The clerk comes over, rings me up, and says to the other woman, did someone cut in? Then the woman, still talking as if I'm invisible, describes how I cut in. Well this is news to me. So I looked at the woman and said, "no one was standing at the counter. No one was even near the counter. And no one said, excuse me, I'm in line." So the other woman proceeds to tell me what a bad person I am because there was a line and I just cut right in.

I still don't know where the freaking line was. And I still don't know why no one was standing at the counter if they were hoping to be waited on. And I don't know why someone didn't say, "excuse me, but I was here first". Isn't that the normal etiquette? So I told the clerk, "fine, I'll just pick this up later. Please, wait on this woman." I told the complaining lady, "Look, lady, I'm terribly sorry. I didn't see a line and no one said anything, but I'm leaving now. Are you happy?" (Yes, there was a tone.) Oh, and I may have uttered the word "bitch" as I walked away.

See, this is why I try to minimize my contact with people. I just don't need this shit. I've had a bad week and have had to take a lot of shit from people....all of it undeserved. I certainly don't need one more asshat giving me grief.

And memo to people wanting to be waited on...stand at the freaking counter so people know you're waiting!! Don't stand 8 feet away. And if someone does inadvertantly cut in front of you, a little, "I'm sorry, I'm in line" is the appropriate approach.

Yea, I'm the bad person. I admit it. Are you all happy now? (Sorry, James. Looks like you'll be going to the pharmacy to pick up those needles. I don't think I'll be going back.)

Hippy Dippy Weathermen

I'm one of those people who will sit and watch the Weather Channel because I find the weather reports to be so much more entertaining and uplifting than the regular news. Sometimes I watch for the actual weather, and sometimes it's for the show. Check out what I mean.

This is Jim Kosek from Accuweather.com. You gotta love the hat...and the enthusiasm.



This is Mark Mathis from Fox Charlotte. Poor Mark was apparently battling some substance abuse issues and ended up in rehab. He's back in Charlotte on TV, though, so I think it's okay to still laugh at this.



Then there's this guy from another Fox channel who suddenly developed tourettes.



My all time favorite weatherman is Dave Schwartz, formerly of the Weather Channel. I was truly bummed out when Dave was let go last year. Check out one of Dave's best:



And another classic Dave clip



And finally, a little nostalgia with Al Sleet from 1966.

How do men do it?

There's no doubt that it's a man's world. Men have most of the power and money, etc. That being said, there's one area where I don't think men have it easier - their "junk". I've often told my male friends that I just don't know how they can walk around with that stuff. It shrinks in the cold, it can get caught in zippers, it's just complicated stuff.

Today, though, I learned of 2 more issues associated with the male member.

Issue 1 - where men carry their wallets. Because men don't carry something practical, like a purse, they must put their wallets in their pants pockets if they're not wearing a jacket. Most men put their wallet in their back pocket. Some men carry their wallet in their front pocket. Apparently, though, the front pocket men risk having their stuff pinched. Yes!! There is a risk of a penis pinch from carrying a wallet in a front pocket. A local radio show did an entire segment on this today. Who knew that the simple act of putting a wallet in a front pocket could be so risky?

Issue 2 - underwear. We all know that male briefs have that little flap for easy access. Did you also know that the flap is made for right handed men? I didn't. In fact, I never gave that issue a thought until today...and I'm left handed. I'm sensitive to the left handed challenges. Well, thankfully, the Hom Company has now come out with a line of briefs with a horizontal slit that makes it equal for both righties and lefties. An article in the Telegraph states, "Hom, the company behind the pants, claim the underwear will 'save left handed men up to three, often vital, seconds when visiting the loo"'. The article further states, "While boxer shorts usually have an central opening, Y-fronts and trunks traditionally have a right-handed opening, making it potentially more tricky for left-handed men when they are standing at a urinal. The Hom underwear has an opening slit made horizontally underneath the waistband." The head of buying for men's accessories in a UK department store said: “Switching the opening from vertical to horizontal may sound like a small step, but it’s the major breakthrough that many have been waiting for.”

Special underwear, wallet placing, zipper risks, shrinkage...men, your things are trouble. Seriously, I don't know how you guys walk around with those things.