Just Another Day in Studville...

Karaoke in the Lion's Den

Here's a little story from my remote training camp at Point Sebago Campground in Maine:

On Thursday, Amy and I were enjoying our new camping ritual of attending happy hour at the Sebago Lounge while all the kids were in day camp.  There was a big crowd that day, maybe 60-plus.  Two DJ's had set up a karaoke machine on the stage and started to cajole people to come up and do a little karaoke.  There were no takers for a while, so they started threatening the crowd by claiming they would start singing their own karaoke songs if someone didn't start things off, and they emphasized that none of us would find such a scenario enjoyable.  Sure enough, they made good on their threat and started singing the old cowboy song, Rawhide.

With a half-a-bottle of Sebago Boathouse Brown Ale and a handful of nacho's in my system I was feeling pretty loose and unusually bold.  I then decided that I didn't want to listen to these clowns sing Rawhide for the rest of happy hour!  So...despite Amy threatening to rip my kidneys out, I strolled up to the stage, filled out the form to indicate the song I'd like to sing and handed it to the DJ.  I looked back at Amy to find that her head was down on the table, buried in her arms.

As I bounced up on stage the DJ started reading the form I filled out and announced, "Yup!  Rawhide does it every time!  OK...it looks like our first singer today will be Mike Keenan from South Glastonbury, Connecticut and he will be singing...oh good Lord!" 

He then re-read the form.  "Great.  It appears that Mike here has decided to touch off a full-blown riot."  He then looked up at me and noticed for the first time that I was wearing a Yankees cap.

"Hi everyone,"  I shouted.  "By a show of hands, how many Yankee fans do we have in the house today?"  Immediately, half the crowd stood up and started yelling at me while flashing thumbs-down signs and other inappropriate hand gestures.  Please note that this was southern Maine, which is a whole lot closer to Boston than it is to the Bronx.

"Not one Yankees fan," I replied.  "Perfect!"  Then, right on cue, the music started and I launched into New York, New York by Frank Sinatra.  It was hard to concentrate on the screen with all the profanity being screamed at me, but I managed to get through the whole song (I noticed, for the first time, that the song is mercifully short).  I then took a long and dramatic bow, which only triggered even louder boo'ing, and then had a hard time finding my seat at the back of the room since Amy was now hiding under the table.

Sure enough, after I left the stage there was a surge of people who were suddenly interested in doing some karaoke.  The next act was a pair of women who shouted, "Sit down, Mike!!!" into the microphone as soon as they got up on stage and then launched into some song about Boston and dirty water.  Well, at least we didn't have to worry about hearing Rawhide again.

Did I mention that I recently started drinking beer?...

Old Time Rock & Roll

While the Headphone War rages on it seems a new skirmish has erupted concerning music. Putting aside for a moment the different opinions of whether wearing MP3 players during workouts is good or bad let's explore the latest division in the ranks.
During a recent team workout Whole Wheat initiated a debate about the best songs of all time. One can only suspect that he started this to take his mind off the pain he was experiencing with the track repeats. We now know that Wonderbread is a big fan of Bon Jovi but it was unfortunate to hear some of Whole Wheat's nominees (Vanilla Ice, James Taylor). Wonderbread was heard repeatedly offering up the name Madonna. I had no idea that he was such a big fan of the Material Girl and knew all her songs. The things you learn when the lactic acid builds up in the legs!
On the way home Whole Wheat confessed that he was a long-time admirer of "George Thoreau and Destroyers" as well as Emerson, Lake and Palmer. He went on to mention the names of some little-known offshoot '70s bands such as the "Consistent C's" and "The Hob Goblins". I wasn't sure what he was saying but he man clearly has an opinion on the matter.
The lesson here is that group runs can be quite informative in ways that you may never have expected. So it therefore suggested that group runs be limited to once a week.

Runnin' Long with Dave Matthews

I recently ripped and burned a Dave Matthews Band album onto my MP3; Live at Folsom Stadium, which is located in Boulder, CO (Colorado's distance running answer to Glastonbury).  A big thank-you to Ricky for introducing me to this "rip & burn" technology.  By the way, are we sure this is legal?  It doesn't feel like it is.  How do these musicians make any money these days?  I guess that explains the astronomically-high prices for concert tickets.

Anyway, I've been firing it up for long runs recently and I am slowly evolving into a big DMB fan.  Which is kind of weird because the band was pretty big on the college scene in the mid-90's when I was in college and law school, but I never much cared for them.  Now, at age 35 with three little kids I'm finally starting to appreciate their tunes.  They're great to listen to on long runs because of the variety they offer from song to song.  It's a unique rock syntax with violins and saxophone in the lineup, and they end up weaving a lot of jazz and pop with a grass-roots feel into their music.  Not to mention that their jam-band sound seems psychologically perfect for long runs.

One other appealing aspect of the band is that I took a peak at their website, and those guys are just continuously on tour!  And that workhorse persona is something that resonates with all distance runners!

For a sample of DMB tunes, click here to get to their Facebook page which offers 18 full-length live tracks that you can listen to on your computer (can't download them).  Warehouse comes highly recommended...it's now on my top-10 list of tunes to run to.