An Arizona Cheesehead's Thoughts

I spent the first part of August in beautiful Detroit Lakes MN (beautiful in August, pretty sure I wouldn't think the same in January) for a super big and long running country music show. It was my third WEFest and I truly love the event. When people ask me about the lineup, I start rattling off all of the acts. Most people, unless they listen to The Highway on Sirius/XM, go glassy eyed and politely nod because there are a bunch of up and comers they've never heard of. There are also always some "classic" country acts that have been around for a long time and that the young listeners may not know. I listen to The Highway about 90% of the time in my car so I know all the newbies. I've also been listening to country since high school which is, sadly, long enough ago to know the classic artists, too. Here are my thoughts on the performances. Any quotes are actually paraphrased because I wasn't smart enough to write them down right away and it's been ...

People who know me fairly well know that I HATE to admit that anyone is smarter than I. If you don't believe me on that statement, ask Steven or Sugar Daddy or The Rocket Scientist or Unruly Julie or, well, the list goes on. There is one guy that I'm willing to concede that may be smarter than I, but I'm very willing to admit that he's far more clever. That guy would be old What's His Name? (For the non-Parrot Heads reading this, What's His Name? translates to Bob Karwin.) Bob's a lawyer by day, Trop Rock musician by day and night and is fortunate enough to be married to a wonderful woman and have two gorgeous and well behaved children. He's also quite the pundit and the last person you want to heckle while he's on stage. He'll eviscerate you in less than a heartbeat and you may not even realize it. So, here's the reason for this hype about Karwin. He recently started a show at Beachfront Radio which is an internet station that features a l...

I was listening to my favorite radio station this week when the DJ said, "The new Diamondbacks uniforms suck". (An opinion I completely share, BTW.) He got an email from a listener who said he shouldn't use that kind of language because people had their kids in the car with the radios on at that time of the morning. Sugar Daddy's initial response to when I told him about it was, "Well then, don't listen." But, it made me start thinking. What's the objection to suck? It's pretty much part of our common lexicon. Is it crude? Or, just too severe? Would she have objected to "bite", "blow" or " reek "? It's not like it was an actual curse word so I don't quite understand her complaint. I know I'm not the best judge because I sound like the proverbial drunken sailor on my worst days and I'm not much better even on my good ones. So, I have a high threshold when it comes to inappropriate language. B...