He Got a Tattoo On His Arm That Say Baby

Running From the Man in Oklahoma City With a 500-Gallon Tank

"You should ask her out," they said.

I don't know. Doesn't she have a boyfriend?

"Yeah. He's on parole."

For what?

"Nothing violent. Nothing serious. But he gets jealous easy."

What is it with girls and bad boys? Wait, what happens when he gets jealous?

"Before he would've beat the shit out of you. But that doesn't seem likely now. He's on parole. He has to watch himself."

She's kind of cool... but I don't know.

"You should ask her out. It's not fair that all the assholes get all the cool girls."

Yeah. But also... no.

Sold My Soul For Less

In that long tunnel of time...

I loved this song the first time I heard it as a kid.

I knew there was something amazing and important about it. Even if it would be many years before I'd have the life experience to imagine what that amazing, important thing was.

And now, it's been more time since Jim Croce died than it was between his birth and his death.

Which makes the song seem more fragile and beautiful now than ever before.

Or maybe I'm finally old enough to understand.

If Words Could Make Wishes Come True

...save every day like a treasure and then, again...

"It used to be better," she said.

I nodded. "Much better."

"I mean, they had to change the packaging and I really liked the old package."

"And the flavor. It tastes different now."

"Not as good."

I nodded again.

We were silent for a long time. Sitting on the big rock that balanced at the edge of the waterfall near the state park that we'd agreed had to be the most beautiful state park in the entire world.

"A lot of things used to be better," she said. "Not just the food."

And I looked around and thought of the many things in our hometown that used to be better and had changed. And the many things in art and music and movies and literature that were so much worse than what had come before.

And I had to agree with her.

We smiled, confident and comfortable in the fact that we alone had a handle on what was right and what had gone wrong.

It was that brief moment when we knew literally everything there was to know. When we had discovered the absolute and total truth.



We were 14 years old.

Soon, we'd be smart enough to realize how much we didn't know. But that one cloudy afternoon, we knew it all.

Even if no one would listen.

Moving Ahead So Life Won't Pass Me By

Sometimes there are benefits (pun intended) to living in Los Angeles.

Last night I went to a benefit concert put on by Charles Fox for the Fulfillment Fund (a mentoring group for at-risk High School students).

The concert featured Jeff Barry (who wrote so many great songs with Ellie Greenwich), David Pack (from the band Ambrosia), Richard Marx, Felix Cavaliere (from the Rascals), Norman Gimbel (Fox's longtime songwriting partner), songwriter Allee Willis, and many others.

Fox has written a ton of songs you know (including lots of 70s TV theme songs -- "Love American Style," "Happy Days," etc., etc.), but my favorite song that he wrote was "I Got a Name," recorded by Jim Croce in the early 1970s.

Yeah, it's got the requisite cheesy 70s strings, but I keep thinking the time is right for a great indie-rock remake of this song.

And in the meantime... enjoy Jim Croce singing a classic song written by Gimbel & Fox: