Cap’n Ken’s Homespun Wisdom

There was a story in the AJC this morning about the city of Atlanta”s plan to bring Buckhead bars to Underground Atlanta. Turns out there”s a loophole in the new closing-time (2:30 last call, 3:00 close) that allows bars at Underground to serve until 4:00 a.m., and now the city has a grand plan to make Underground the central “entertainment district.”

The story says there are at least 5 Buckhead bars which have signed up to either move to or open new locations at Underground. Those are Mako”s, Masquerade, Tongue & Groove, Loca Luna and Black Bear Tavern.

According to the story, “Underground management invited those clubs because they have reputations for being well-run establishments that do not have histories of attracting crime, city officials said.”

It goes on: “Buckhead”s troubles were in part associated with hip-hop clubs. So far no hip-hop clubs are included in Underground”s new lineup. But [Councilman] Willis said he is courting reputable hip-hop club operators.”

OK, let me get this straight. Buckhead, Atlanta”s most affluent neighborhood, has a problem with out-of-control hip-hop clubs and their non-Buckhead patrons (the shooter and his two victims in the Club Chaos incident last year were all from New York).

And Downtown, which - by definition - should appeal to the “urban” types, is trying to attract bar patrons.

So the solution is to get the “white” clubs in Buckhead to open locations at Underground and let the hip-hop clubs which city officials say they don”t want at Underground to remain open in Buckhead?

Alrighty.

The AJC piece goes on to say that Underground makes a perfect “entertainment district” because entry to the indoor complex can be easily controlled, reducing the chance of unmanageable crowds, and that Downtown”s “maze of one-way streets should deter the cruising traffic that has plagued Buckhead on weekend nights.”

Again, the uncontrolled crowds and cruising comes from the hip-hop clubs, not the kinds of places the city has signed to open at Underground.

What, exactly, is the city”s end game here? Obviously, they want Underground to become popular, because the city owns the place. And it”s obvious that they want to keep out the kind of establishments that have ruined Buckhead (and as landlord, the city has that ability).

If their plan works, Underground will become a thriving, safe party district full of only “reputable” clubs. But what about Buckhead? The places like Chaos (and their clientele) aren”t welcome at Underground, but they apparently can stay in Buckhead. And if Tongue & Groove”s Underground location is a big hit, might not the club cut its losses in Buckhead and close shop there? That would open up one more space for a hip-hop club, bringing even more crowds and cruising, and helping chase out other “reputable” clubs. Rinse, repeat … and what does Buckhead look like in 10 years?

It seems like a huge conflict of interest when the city has a financial stake in Underground and appears to be favoring its own bottom line over the safety and quality of life for Buckhead residents.

Oct. 30 update: For all you fine folks coming through Google and Yahoo looking for the video of Brian Kinchen talking “gay”, I was going to get it for you, but YouTube has taken it down. Bummer. But Kinchen is a good guy with a great Super Bowl story if you want to read my original post:

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Now that we”re smack-dab in the middle of Super Bowl Week, the game (and surrounding hoopla) is beginning to draw my attention.

So far, a lot of the human-interest hype has centered - rightfully so - on Panthers QB Jake Delhomme. Jake is the Kurt Warner of 2003, having come from nowhere to lead his team to the Super Bowl. And, as a bonus, Jake”s from Breaux Bridge, Louisiana and played college ball for the Ragin” Cajuns of USL. I can already hear the Zydeco music and see the big pot of crawfish the Super Bowl producers will no doubt use to “color the package.”

I really hope, however, that the Super Bowl producers took the time to drive an hour east to Baton Rouge to uncover a great Super Bowl story of a different sort; that of Patriots long-snapper Brian Kinchen.

A feature story on the long-snapper? Hold on a second, Sparky. There”s a great story here.

I”ll admit I was completely unaware of this story until I read a piece this week in The Advocate (The Baton Rouge daily, not the national gay newspaper).

Here”s how the story goes:

Brian Kinchen, a standout for LSU back in the 1980s, is part of a lengendary Louisiana football family. His dad, Gus, played on LSU”s first national championship team in 1958, and Brian and his little brother Todd grew up in Baton Rouge dreaming of being Tigers someday. Brian played tight end for the Tigers in the mid-1980s and Todd played wide receiver in the early-1990s.

Both brothers went on to play in the NFL, with Todd spending 8 years in the league and making it to the Super Bowl with - unfortunately - the Atlanta Falcons.

Brian spent 13 years in the NFL, retiring after the 2000 season. That season was spent, ironically, with the Carolina Panthers.

Brian returned to Baton Rouge, played some celebrity golf events, and began coaching the middle-school football team at Parkview Baptist School. Last fall he began teaching Bible class to 7th-graders at Parkview.

Then, in mid-December, he got a call from the New England Patriots. Seems the Pats had lost both of their long snappers, and New England coach Bill Belichick - for whom Kinchen long-snapped years ago in Cleveland - suggested the team dial Brian up.

Fortunately, the 38-year-old Kinchen is a workout nut and was still in reasonable physical condition after being out of the game for three years. Still, the story goes, he struggled with the decision whether to leave his family and students to try out as the new Patriots long-snapper.

He talked it over with his class, and the kids responded - in effect - “Are you fucking kidding?? Jesus, you have to do this!!” [note: it is highly unlikely that the 7th-grade Bible class at Parkview would use such language].

So he went up to Foxboro, landed the gig, snapped without error during the playoffs and now finds himself in the Super Bowl Sunday. And it”s not like he”s a bench jockey. He”s the long-snapper, meaning he”s in the game for every New England punt, field goal and extra point, playing a key role in that whole “snap, hold, kick” thing.

Six weeks ago, Kinchen was teaching the little kids about Jesus, and now he”s in the Super Bowl. Yes, it sounds like a Dennis Quaid movie (”The Rookie”, to be exact). But it”s still a hell of a story. I hope CBS gets around to telling it.

As for my game prediction, I have to go with New England. Any team with 4 former Tigers (Rohan Davey, Kevin Faulk and Jarvis Green in addition to Kinchen), has to be the favorite.

In fairness to my UGA friends, I will note that the SEC runner-up has the most (5) former players in the Super Bowl this year. Patrick Pass & Richard Seymour on the Patriots and John Kasey, Jermaine Wiggins & Will Witherspoon for the Panthers.

USC, it should be noted, has only 3 players in the Super Bowl. The Associated Press is expected to name the Trojans the “Champions of putting former players in Super Bowl XXXVIII” on Saturday.

Tuesday night trivia at the Universal Joint in Oakhurst has become a semi-regular thing for me and a group of guys I worked with back in my Evil Empire days.

The U-Joint, if you don”t know, is a hip little neighborhood bar that used to be a service station (Universal Joint = car part, you see). It”s owned by the husband of another Evil Empire alum, thus leading to our team name of “Guys Doing Brenda*” (her husband Langston* runs trivia night). It”s a good time because Langston pulls some wacky shit together for his questions.

So last night it was myself, Big Ed, P. Diddy, The WB, Jimmy Show and Encyclopedia Brown comprising the Brenda Doers.

We overcame some missteps (Kansas, not Illinois, is named for the “south wind people”, Johnny Unitas also played for the Chargers, not the Steelers) to pull out the victory. The keys were our knowing that Hank Williams referenced a pirogue in “Jambalaya” (hey, I grew up in Louisiana) and that an urban legend said Mr. Green Jeans was the father of Frank Zappa. On both those questions, we had the only correct answers and they were in the hands of Langston before he could even finish asking the questions. After that, there was no question that we had the “Joementum”.

Encyclopedia Brown also pulled the name of Barney Fife”s never-seen girlfriend (Juanita) out of the deep recesses of his mind, and I think we were the only ones to get that right.

It was our first-ever win, grabbing us $30 in house cash to help offset the big bill we”d run up. Seems, however, that the top prize used to be $50 …

And by the end of the night, we”d attracted the attention of this 26-year-old girl sitting next to us with her boyfriend. We had suspected them of lifting our answers during the game, which led E.B. to cast a lot of evil looks their way. But by the time the (optional) big bonus question came around, she was over at our table being all sweet and 26, trying to find out if she should turn in her answers for who the first 5 members of the Baseball Hall of Fame were. Considering the clue said they were elected in 1936 and her list included Joe DiMaggio (who began his major-league career in 1936) and Hank Aaron (who was born in 1934), we advised against turning it in.

* name changed to protect the innocent

I went up to Harry”s Farmers Market at lunch today. Yes, despite the buyout by Whole Foods, there are still two (I think) Harry”s left here in Atlanta.

Harry”s was - and is - a wonderful place. Back when I lived in Roswell & Alpharetta, I was there all the time. I”d take friends and family there when they came up to visit. Love it.

That”s not the point of this piece, though.

When I pulled up to the store today, there was a woman pulling out of a primo spot right up front. I started to swing in to it when I noticed the sign - “Parking for Senior Citizens”.

Then I look at the empty spot next to it. “Parking for Expectant Mothers.”

Across the row - “Parking for Customers with Children.”

Well, f*ck me. I”m not old, I can”t bear children and have yet to bring a little Cap”n into the world.

I didn”t see a “Parking for People Just Going About Their Business” sign, but I assumed any of the 30 or so spots not reserved for the handicapped, the old, the pregnant or the yard-ape-laden were OK for me to use.

Of course, Harry”s should be able to reserve parking for whomever they want. In my mind, if they want to have “Whites Only” parking, I think that should be within their rights. Obviously they think it”s good for their business to cater to the old, pregnant and crumb-crusher-carrying customers with special treatment.

I”d like to suggest, however, a little modification. Up next to the store, they should have a “Parking for Customers with Children who Know how to Handle their Children in Public” sign and way, way in the back should be a “Parking for Customers with Children they Refuse to Control in Public” sign.

I could go along with that.

I mentioned a while back in my Fame, fortune and friends piece that one of the “famous” people I know is Bill Davis, founder and frontman of Dash Rip Rock. Dash, if you don”t know, is Baton Rouge”s most famous musical export since John Fred and The Playboys.

So every once in a while, I pop in to the Dash site to see what”s up. Bill now has a Yahoo! Group that includes a bunch of photos through the years, and apart from the pics of Bill playing the Grand Ole Opry (seriously, he made the Opry) and last year”s recording session with none other than Glenn Tilbrook (he”s the frontman for Squeeze, in case you”re not cool enough to know that), there was one very old picture that grabbed my attention:

It is, of course, a very early press photo of the band. Those of you (TCL, Scott) who had the pleasure of coming of age in Baton Rouge during the early/mid 1980s will notice that the man in the middle is none other than original DRR drummer F. Clarke Martty. Clarke was booted about 10 gigs in to the band”s career in favor of the manic, over-energized and Church”s Fried Chicken-stealing Fred LeBlanc (now heading Cowboy Mouth).

A simple press photo, but man does it touch on a lot of the history of Cap”n Ken.

First off, there”s Dash Rip Rock themselves.

Allow me, if you will, to transport you back to Baton Rouge, Louisiana - circa 1984. During the early 1980s, the Baton Rouge music scene was potent and fun. A lot of people trace the origins of the B.R. scene to a single night - Monday, January 9, 1978 - when the Sex Pistols played The Kingfish.

The kids who saw the Pistols - and those who heard about the show - started buying punk records and forming bands of their own. By 1982, the scene included The Times, Harry Dog and The Fleas, The Shitdogs, Bobbo, Scooter and The Mopeds and The Human Rayz.

I started 1982 as a 14-year-old spoiled “rich” kid with no exposure to local music. I had discovered The Clash, Elvis Costello, The B-52s and Devo, but had no idea what was going on down the road near LSU. But a funny thing happened that year - we got poor. Quick. I”d tell you that story, but you wouldn”t believe it.

But all of a sudden my family was poor, so we moved from our big house with a pool to a crappy little townhouse in a crappy part of town (still close to LSU, though). One day I walk out the front door and see the kid who lived across the walkway standing in his doorway playing electric guitar. The kid I met that day is Lee Barbier - currently in The Myrtles and now the elder statesman of the Baton Rouge rock scene.

Lee introduced me to a kid who lived across the street named Bobby Cook. Bobby”s sister”s boyfriend happened to be the frontman for The Times. So the first live club show I saw was The (U.S.) Times at The Chimes sometime in 1983.

Long story short(er), hanging out with Lee got me in to good, local music. Shows at the LSU Greek Theater and Oak Grove coupled with those times when we could sneak in to The Chimes exposed me to many of the aforementioned bands and all sorts of great, local music.

And it was in 1983 that Lee and I discovered rockabilly. Rank and File, The LeRoi Brothers, Jason and the Scorchers and The Beat Farmers (the only album I”ve every bought before ever hearing the band - they just looked so cool) became the foundation of our musical existence. Lee loved to swap out Hank Jr. tapes for The LeRoi Brothers at keg parties. Sometimes the rednecks noticed; sometimes they did not.

So when we heard that the guy from The Human Rayz was forming a rockabilly band with a guy from Scooter and The Mopeds, we were pumped. Lee and I (and a couple of other guys - maybe Scott?) left a party one Saturday night to go see Dash Rip Rock play their second gig ever. The audience consisted of us and Bill”s Human Rayz bandmates. I think that”s why he became friends with us.

Not long after, they played an outdoor gig at LSU”s Oak Grove. I taped that show through a boombox I sat on top of our ice chest. I captured a very early version of “Marsupial” along with a dozen bad country covers and countless interjections of “Hey, want a beer?” followed by the sound of the boombox being moved, ice shuffling, etc. That tape is among my now-lost treasures.

The emergence of Dash Rip Rock was a turning point in my life. Not so much because of DRR themselves (although we”d see just about every gig they played in Baton Rouge), but because they made me obsessed with live music. At 16 and 17 years old, many of my weekends included shows at The Chimes, The Bayou or other venues around town.

Without DRR, I probably wouldn”t have seen the Red Hot Chili Peppers or Jason and the Scorchers at the LSU Cotillion Ballroom. Or Mojo Nixon, The Georgia Satellites, The Flat Duo Jets or The Tailgators at The Chimes. Or The Beat Farmers at The Bayou. Or that amazing Mardi Gras show at Jimmy”s in New Orleans (DRR, Hoodoo Gurus, The dBs, The Fleshtones). Or The Replacements or They Might Be Giants at Tipitina”s. Or, for that matter, Rocket From the Crypt at Echo Lounge two years ago.

I don”t listen to “mainstream” music. I hate commercial radio. The last arena concert I went to was The Police”s on their Synchronicity tour. I like new, interesting music and I like seeing shows at clubs.

And the picture above represents that for me. It was the beginning of DRR, and it was the beginning of a great period of my life.

But also take a look at the backdrop of that photo. You”ll notice the boys are in front of the “Old Colonel”s Club,” which was this great - but mostly unknown - bar tucked away under the Perkins Road overpass in Baton Rouge”s garden district.

The Old Colonel”s Club was where TCL and I went to watch the election night coverage of the 1991 Louisiana gubernatorial primary. That was the race that pitted then-Governor Buddy Roemer against Edwin Edwards and David Duke. Roemer finished 3rd, meaning the next governor of Louisiana would be either Edwards or Duke.

It was that night at the Old Colonel”s Club that TCL and I decided we had to get out of Louisiana. I left about six months later. It took TCL a little longer, but we are now both happy and successful in Atlanta.
The Old Colonel”s Club closed down sometime after I left the state. A few years later it would be opened as a restaurant owned by my sister and her husband. It also closed.

So, you see, the photo above represents not only the beginning of my life as a hipster music junkie, but also the end of my days as a prisoner of Louisiana.

I”m minding my own business today when I get an email from a fellow blogger I”ll refer to as “Jake”*. It read:

“I can”t believe none of us has blogged about the frequently run banner ad picture on all of our blogs that depicts a guy eating a girl”s ass. It”s been running for a good month now.”

My initial, internal response was “qua?” Then I started wondering what Jake”s been writing about to get Blogger to put such an ad on his site.

So I went to his site - nope, just Blogger text ads. I came to the Wisdom and only found only ads for Cajun Sausage (damn good site - CajunGrocer.com, BTW).

I wrote back expressing my puzzlement. Jake writes back saying he”s not sure what the ad is, but everybody at his office sees this ad, which appears to have something to do with R Kelly.

A quick aside on Jake”s employer. It”s a notoriously conservative and controlling place. Supposedly all emails are filtered and kicked back for having dirty words, and, as Jake said, they can”t even pull up Playboy.com (he tried today). Yet he sees an ad for some R Kelly product that involves nuzzling a woman”s rear end.

So then he sends me the ad image. Nope, never seen that before. It”s for somebody supposedly selling the R Kelly sex video.

I ask the wife if she sees ads for buttnuzzle videos when she”s on a blog. Nope. She suggests maybe there”s some kind of SpyWare on Jake”s PC and those of his officemates. Could be.

I get Jake and another friend of mine over there to confirm this is not a joke. They say it”s not a joke; they really see this on all BlogSpot sites.

So the question - as a public service - is whether any of you see this ad when visiting C.K.H.W. or other BlogSpot sites.
My high personal ethics prevent me from dropping the image into the Wisdom, but if you want to see what we”re talking about, click here.

* Name changed to protect the reputation of “Jake”.