Martin Luther advocated drinking when you are in despair. This, of course, must make Puritanical America (or as one local radio show guy calls it "Biddy Nation") quite despondent themselves, in that one of the founders of their disputation would advocate such behavior. The Calvinists (which Puritanism has historic roots in) never quite got along well with Luther--well not many people seemed to get on with Luther all that well.

We've been having a discussion of sorts over at Kendra's about "meh." I pointed out that it comes from the Simpsons--there is a scene where Bart and Lisa a sitting in their room and Homer comes in and they, for some reason say "meh" and Homer says "what's that?" and they say "meh. M.E.H. meh."

Meh. That's how I've been feeling these days. Its not the rain. That makes me happy. I think it is just a general overall meh.

Meh.

Season meh disorder? Nah. Its Spring.

Meh.

And so it rained.

We were going to walk to the Urban Lounge (don't ask me why their page is an incomplete one about remote viewing) to see a friend's bands (yes he was playing in two bands), but the rain prevented that. Arranging alternate transportation was a snap, and we arrived at said Lounge without incident.

We all know the folks at the door, and I spent a bit of time chatting with Brett, my next-door-neighbor and Urban Lounge bouncer. Brett is tall, you see, perhaps the tallest person I've ever met off the basketball court. This sets him up well to be a bouncer, since most pip squeaks who make trouble are at least 2 feet shorter than him.

So we had arrived and it was the usual scene of the over and under styled, and I, as usual, felt gloriously out of place. I bought a round of drinks and listened to the first band, flirted with the cute woman behind the bar and wanted to sit down. The day had gotten to me, I think. I had been up for unknown reasons at 5:00 am and then spent they afternoon wandering around Salt Lake in search of pure water and entertainment.

So there I was, tired, no place to sit and getting more pissy and drunk by the minute.

The next band up, while generally harmless, pushed me over the edge. They started out in a bad way--being overly obsessive about volume levels and too many mic checks. Now I suppose there is no harm in making sure that you have the right volume in your monitor, but from my experience with live music and particularly at the Lounge it doesn't make a bit of difference and you certainly don't have to spend a half hour doing it. In any case, the music wasn't necessarily bad, but based on its volume and basically that it was one long screaming wail from start to finish there was no need to irritate me and other with so much setup time. The crowd thinned after the band hit their stride with their 8th song and I felt a bit bad for them and stuck around, but as I said, I was getting irritated and drunk and tired and hoarse from yelling comments to my friends and mad that I was thinking of ditching those friends and torqued that I would then be passing on a late-night fun-filled extravaganza so it was out the door for yours truly.

The rain had stopped but it was not too cold. I dodged the puddles as I made my way up the hill to home.