The Original Blog

I've had depression for as long as I can remember. For most of that time I have self-medicated in one form or another. As I get older, my relationship with my mental health has matured and I find myself looking at it and dealing with it in different ways. And looking back since the days of Covid, I remember the dozen-plus friends that I've lost, though not all of them were from depression, and realize that confronting our mental health and finding a way to live with it is crucial. Through my 25 years of bartending, I came to understand what alcoholism really looks like. I saw it every night and it looked different on every person. What I came to know, to truly know and believe, is that alcoholism is not something that can be determined by filling out some government questionaire. It is an individual disease. What becomes a problem for one person does not effect the other person. I could serve one regular six doubles of Jack Daniels and feel fine with how they were. And I could ...

I've been wondering lately which one of my kids is going to catch the music bug. Or if any of them will. I was about 8 years old (Wyatt's age) when I caught the bug. I remember a Christmas around that time when I got two albums, Elton John's Greatest Hits and Neil Diamond's Greatest Hits. I wore those albums out! And my aunt Nan loaned me a stack of albums and said that one day I'd thank her. I can't remember the exact albums, but I know one was Frank Zappa. One was the Rolling Stones. I believe there was a Zeppelin and a Grateful Dead. When I first got into music, it was all vinyl. There was a local music shop in Fayetteville called Paradise Records. They also had tapes. Then one day these things called CDs appeared. The CD section was tiny at first. And my first CD was Huey Lewis and the News 'Sports.' But that section quickly grew and before you knew it, the record section was almost non-existent. We used to go to the record shop all the time. Back th...

  Now for some thoughts about bars and bartending, which I did for 25 years. BIG disclaimer: these are my opinion. They're opinions based on a ton of experience on both sides of the bar. But please don't take them as fact. Within the hierarchy of the restaurant, the bartender is right behind the chef at the very top. Both the chef and the bartender are responsible for creating things. Both should be expertly skilled. And both are the reasons that guests come to the restaurant. I got my first bartending gig in 1998. I attended a bartending school which the BIGGEST waste of time and money. I'll explain why shortly. My first gig was at the Angus Barn. I didn't know what the hell I was doing. I had never bartended a day in my life. But their hiring philosophy was to hire good people (which they couldn't train) and then train those good people to do what they needed to do. I was there for two years. I got better with each shift. Looking back I realize that I was awful. A...

  Father’s day 2025. This is my 9th Father's Day as a dad. It is my 52nd Father’s Day having a father. And I’ll tell y’all one thing, it is a much different day now that it’s also about me. It puts everything in a much different perspective. It lets me contemplate this fatherhood trip in a larger context and for the first time in my life, I get to see the world through my father’s eyes. I can’t begin to tell you what it is like to become a parent for the first time. This post isn’t about spewing cliches that we’ve all heard 1,000 times. Y’all get it. Parenthood changes you. So many little things you’d never expect. I’ll address those in a later post perhaps. The one change that I’ve found most profound is how becoming a father has completely changed my memories of childhood. Every single memory I have of my childhood is now seen through the eyes of a father. I can still see the events from the eyes of the younger me, but standing above those young eyes is the older me, the father, ...

  Quite possibly the best band touring at the moment...

  I found this band from Australia recently named The Bamboos. Really digging them lately, especially this little tune!

So here we are in 2012. The month of January has already past in this the year 2012. And I have myself a new computer. One with a ton of memory. Memory I can use to write, and write, and write some more. So I guess then that I should write. I used to love to write on this blog. The entries weren't long. They weren't profound. But they were consistent. I need to get back into the habit of regularly writing some shit down. Maybe, just maybe, the next great American novel is waiting inside me. Its just waiting to break out. I'm drinking a PBR and listening to Norah Jones right now. Its late at night and I should be getting to bed. My beagles are snoring on my bed right now. I should sleep. I've got a double ahead of me tomorrow. And then another double on Saturday. And then after that double, Julie and I are driving to Blacksburg to see her twin and watch the Super Bowl. Go Giants! It should be the Saints against the Pats and not the fucking Giants. But...

Let sleeping beagles lay. Unless of course they begin to snore. And then pick up sleeping beagles and move them to chairs. I want to get two chocolate labs, a brother and a sister from the same litter, and name them "Scully" and "Mulder." I also decided yesterday that I'd like to name my dogs after jazz musicians. I'd have Thelonious Monk, and I'd call him Theo. I'd have Dave Brubeck, and he'd be Dave. I'd have Miles Davis, and he'd be Miles. I'd have Stan Getz, and he'd be Stan. Then there'd be Herbie Hancock, and he'd be Herbie. We'd have a Wayne Shorter and a Chic Corea. A Johnny Coltrane. I'm going to have to have a lot of dogs...