NOT THAT QUESTION!

I have always enjoyed a party.

Except for my first party of course, which came eight days into life.

(If you don’t know what I am referring to, check Seinfeld’s episode five, season five.  Ouch.)

Back to the party.

I like birthday parties, engagement parties, fraternity parties.

I even like the resolve of the Libertarian Party.

Today I was invited to a high school graduation party.

Well, actually I was not invited to the party, but our band was.

In case you are new to my world, as a 43-year old unemployed guy, I was asked to sing in a band with three 40+ year old employed guys.

After my very successful singing career in college, I had no choice but to accept.  

Two weeks ago, we launched this new career at a block party.

Fortunately at our golden age, we were able to remember most of the five songs we played two weeks ago, so today we played the same five songs.

When the 20+ minute show was over, it was time to mingle backstage with the groupies.

Well actually, there was no backstage.

And there were no groupies.

But we had plenty of time to talk to the people who I recognized the face, but didn’t know the person.

I didn’t notice a teleprompter behind me, but you would’ve thought that every person was reading off a script.

Line 1 -- you guys sounded great.

Line 2 -- I love that song by The Clash/Ramones/Weezer...

Line 3 -- so, what do you do for a living?

I guess my singing didn’t convince anyone that rock star is my full-time job, but even worse than that, Line #3 kept reopening that nasty wound.

I thought this was a party.

One thing I have never been good at is lying and at this point in my life, I’m not about to start now.

I think I can hold a poker face that Lady Gaga would be proud of, but even in a little chit-chat, if you ask me a question, you’re gonna get an answer.

Within seconds, maybe milli-seconds, I was telling a stranger about the last 18 months of my life.

TMI.

I had a fantastic fake smile on my face saying that being a stay-at-home dad is the best job in the world.

Which it is, but...

And I would say that every, make that EVERY time I say that I am unemployed, I get a response that my _____ just lost their job too.

Honestly, I don’t really give a damn about your _____ and the last thing I want to do is to be talking about this.

Can’t we talk about how I sounded exactly like Brian Setzer on the Stray Cat Strut.

Do I really need to re-live my demise?

Again!

There was a time, fortunately a short time, when my father was unemployed.

The year was 1979 and through no fault of his own -- dejavu -- he lost his job.

At the time I was 12 and I barely knew how to spell unemployed, no less what it really meant.

All I could tell is that my dad was embarrassed.

He was embarrassed to file for unemployment.  He was embarrassed to talk about it.   He was embarrassed.

The funny thing is that is exactly how I don’t feel.

I am not embarrassed to be unemployed.  Not proud of it, by any stretch, but not embarrassed.

Maybe it’s the world we are living in these days.

While working out last week, I saw that the optimistic Fox News Channel is predicting that we will have 20 million unemployed soon in this country.

Why would I be embarrassed, I am part of the in-crowd.

But even with plenty of company in my new demographic, it still doesn’t feel very good.

Especially when you get that miserable question -- so what do you do? -- over and over and over and over again.

Um, grocery shopping.

Exercise.

Little projects here and there.

All true, by the way.

I was at my son’s baseball game two nights ago, when one of the grandparents, who usually makes a couple of games a year, stopped by to say hello.

He introduced me to his new girlfriend and then asked me, “what is your title over there again?”

Really?

I did my best to summarize my life in three seconds, probably closer to thirty, and then threw in the, “it’s nice to see you again.”

I’m not sure he was buying it.

In fact, I think he probably wished he never would have said hello.

It really wasn’t that big deal and fortunately I was able to deliver the eulogy of my career with a couple of one-liners.

But I think we both wish he would’ve asked about the distance from first base to second base instead of “my title over there again.”

Maybe my bris wasn't so bad after all.

Taking The Stage

Ladies and Gentlemen, THE CLEARANCE RACK.

To paraphrase the great Dennis DeYoung, tonight’s the night we made history.

Tonight was the debut of our new band, The Clearance Rack.

Considering where I bought our matching button-down polka-dotted cowboy shirts, all a size too small by the way, it felt like the perfect name for our group.

If you don’t count the choir at my synagogue growing up, this is only the second band I’ve ever been part of and the first since my Junior year of college.

23 years ago!!!

In case you missed the article in Rolling Stone magazine (or my recent blog), we’ve been a band for all of two weeks.

Short story shorter -- the father of one of my daughter’s friends and his two neighbors loved the video game Rock Band so much, they decided to start their own real band.

Minus a singer.

Yada yada yada.

I guess you know the rest.

Our first gig was tonight at their annual block party -- their 10th annual block party.

Little did I know when I signed up, but this shindig is a pretty big deal around them parts.

I know it may sound like, “the fish was THIIIIIIIIS big,” but there had to be at least 250 people in the crowd.

There was a professional band that went on right before us, which is not the kind of lead-in a bunch of rookies were looking for.

And with no weddings or bar mitzvahs scheduled for today, the pros were able to play an extra long set, really raising that bar.

Even though this is supposed to be fun and not get in the way of the day job, for the 75% of the band with a day job, we’ve been taking this band thing very seriously.

We’ve been practicing for two hours a night, late at night, almost every night, since we met.

Two weeks ago.

We practice at the drummer’s brother’s storage garage.

I guess that qualifies us as a garage band, right?

Well, I’m proud to announce that we didn’t play like trash tonight.

Sure, there were moments that would make Adam Lambert blush.

Try again.

Sure, there were moments that would make Susan Boyle grimace.

Take three.

Sure, there were moments that we’d like to have back, but for a quartet of 40-somethings clearly going through a mid-life crisis, we did not embarrass the family name.

I gotta be honest, this band thing has been a fantastic distraction from the real world.

Now I’m certainly not the first unemployed person to be in a band and I definitely won’t be the last, but for the last two weeks, I have had a job.

And a damn important one!

Did I mention this was the 10th annual block party?

With 25,000 people there.

Sure it would be great if this singing thing was a full-time gig.

And it would be great if we could open for Justin Bieber.

But I’m kinda thinking neither one of those is going to happen.

However, what could happen is another gig to keep us going.

A high school girl at tonight’s show wants us to play at her graduation party.

My sister-in-law wants us to perform at her son’s school.

And there’s always the street corner.

Wow, who knows where this will lead us?

Yes, it’s only been two weeks and yes, you are only as good as your last song -- for us, a bluesy version of the Stray Cat Strut -- but the liquored up audience really thought we were great.

At least that’s what they said.

P.S.  If you are looking for video proof of tonight's masterpiece, it definitely exists.   The version from my video camera looks like it was shot from a cruise ship during the taping of The Perfect Storm, so hopefully I will be able to track down a version that won't give you vertigo.

SET LIST

Should I Stay or Should I Go, The Clash

Blitzkrieg Bop, The Ramones

Island in the Sun, Weezer

Pork & Beans, Weezer

Stray Cat Strut, Stray Cats

Band Of Old Brothers

This just in, I GOT A JOB!!!!

More on that in 228 words.

Long story short, instead of taking the school bus up to my daughter’s retreat last week, I decided to drive my own car.  In my passenger seat was Mike, the father of my one of my daughter’s best friends, a man I had never met before.

In the two plus hours up, we had a chance to learn a lot about each other and I think we both like what we heard.

Like me, Mike is in his 40’s, so we had a lot of in common.

We both like sports, we both worship our kids and we both LOVE music.

Mike told me that he and his neighbors have become obsessed with the video game Rock Band.   Obsessed to the point, where he and a couple of guys from his block have joined together to make their own Rock Band.

When he told me that he plays the expert level on drums, I knew he wasn’t kidding.

I’m not even sure that Buddy Rich could’ve figured out the expert level on Rock Band.

Well after a few months of staring at the video screen late in the early AM, I guess they decided that it was time to try the real thing.

They had Mike on drums, Scott on guitar and Chris on bass, but one piece was missing from this midlife crisis.

A singer.

Enter me.  

On the drive up I made the mistake of telling Mike that I was the singer in a college band.

23 YEARS AGO!!!

Yes, I still sing in the shower.  In the car.   In the kitchen.  Pretty much anywhere I can, but I don’t sing in a band.

Until now.

Mike called me last night and said, “be over at my house in an hour for band practice.”

Yes sir.

Hey, I haven’t had a job interview in a while, so there was no way I was going to turn this one down.

I quickly rummaged through my closet and found my most-ripped up pair of jeans -- that’s what us rock stars do you know -- and I headed over there.

On the way, I stopped at the liquor store to pick up a 12-pack so that they knew I was serious.  That and hopefully the alcohol would inhibit their hearing in case I stunk. 

So I got there, met the band and we jumped right in.

Within a song or two, it was pretty clear that I had nailed this job interview like no other.   

I was waiting for Human Resources to make a formal offer, but instead it was Mike who casually said, “you got the job.”

Really.  

Awesome.

I guess the old guy has still got it.

“Our first gig is in two weeks at our block party and we need to learn four songs.”

So much for the fun and games.

We practiced with real instruments until about 11:00pm, then went back to Scott’s house to play Rock Band for another hour.

Are we wild or what?

Hey, it’s a job and that’s what us working people do.