The Oppenheimer Report 2/1/10

I watched the Grammys tonight, so this report is a rant about today’s pop music, again. First of all, let me say I really like a lot of pop music. Realizing as I do that every generation thinks the music of the succeeding or preceding generation sucks, I still maintain that much of today’s pop music is truly horrible. I don’t particularly care for popular music from the 40’s or 50’s, but at least there was some variety, some hooks, some creativity. Though I never liked “Teen Angel”, I could differentiate it from “Leader of the Pack”. Whatever genre, from “hard” rock, to rap, to easy listening, today’s popular songs remind me of the soul-less housing developments north of Toronto; every house evenly spaced, exactly the same, and without even a trace of individuality … function and economy to the complete exclusion of form. It’s as if the all the people producing this music decided on one voice, one backbeat, one synthesized sound, and one theme. This style was a big hit with our main demographic, so let’s stay exactly in the middle of the box. The other day I found myself humming along to the song “Crimson and Clover” by Tommy James and the Shondells. I hated that song when it came out over thirty years ago, but flipping around the dial, that was a refreshing change over the songs on all the other stations. Go figure! This, along with my comment in last week’s report about Justin Timberlake likely has most of you wondering about my qualifications to judge music. Nevertheless, as an aspiring, hopefully growing songwriter, I am always interested in the music of the present generation. I’m sorry, but if Beyonce, Kanye West, or Taylor Swift are the hot new acts, I say ptoohey!




In my opinion, a pop song should have at least one of two things going for it. Either it should have a serious musical hook (like “Super Freak” by the king of punk funk, Rick “Cleopatra” James), or it should tell an interesting story. Does anybody remember a song called “Timothy” which was a pop hit back I think in the late 70s? That song is about some guys who eat their donkey to survive. Now THAT is story telling … a little sick but interesting nonetheless. Brief aside, I actually saw the band who did that song, years ago in a bar called the Pickle Barrel, somewhere in Vermont. I listened to their whole set in this noisy bar and “Timothy” was their big finale. Talk about your one hit wonders … sentenced to an endless stream of bar dates, and your big hit, the one you do to leave ‘em smiling, is a song about eating a donkey. I bet Mariah Carey never does a song about killing and eating a pack animal. Proof positive that entertainment is not a pretty business. Perhaps those will be my new benchmarks for a good popular song … violent or disgusting. And no, I don’t condone rappers who brag about killing cops, or about abusing their women, but the seemy, lurid side of life can inspire interesting lyrics. Some unique pop tunes I recall from the pop music past: “D.O.A.”, about the dying victim of a car wreck, “Luca” by Suzanne Vega, about child abuse, “Fast Car” by Tracey Chapman, or even “Love Child” by Diana Ross and the Supremes. Everybody knows the song “Mr. Bojangles”? On the surface, it sounds like a touching story about a New Orleans street dancer, and countless singers have covered it. According to singer songwriter David Bromberg, who used to play with Jerry Jeff Walker, the guy who wrote the song, the story is true. Walker wrote “Mr. Bojangles” after some time in jail with the subject. Stripped down to the bare facts, this song is a story, written by a hung over drunk, in jail, about a drunk who shared his jail cell. Charming. One of the discarded lyrics from this song: “I met a man Bojangles, and he stunk real bad, covered in puke”. I think that most (not all) good songs, and probably most good art, comes from a hard place, or at least from genuine life experience.



A moment of silence for J.D. Salinger, author of “Catcher in the Rye” (required reading in most high schools) who died last week. That was a good book.


Last night I held Aladdin's lamp
And so I wished that I could stay
Before the thing could answer me
Well, someone came and took the lamp away
I looked around, a lousy candle's all I found

Well, you don't know what we can find
Why don't you come with me little girl
On a magic carpet ride
Well, you don't know what we can see
Why don't you tell your dreams to me
Fantasy will set you free
Close your eyes girl
Look inside girl
Let the sound take you away
- From the song “Magic Carpet Ride” by Steppenwolf



I want that magic carpet back.



Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 1/25/10

Where to begin. I’ve been somewhat pre-occupied this past week and have only peripherally glanced at the news as I was rushing from here to there. Once again, Mother Nature is front and center in the week’s news. Certainly there was much about the earthquake in Haiti. Not only were there powerful aftershocks from that quake in that beleaguered island, but I understand there was much seismic activity elsewhere in the world, including several quakes in South America. I read in the Saturday Toronto Star that work has begun to build new suburbs outside Port Au Prince. I watched George Clooney’s relief telethon last Friday and grudgingly admit that Justin Timberlake in a trio performing Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” was an amazing performance. I know, I know, he's the anti-christ, but he was good! Big storms last week on the West Coast of the United State. Los Gatos, California, wherever that is, received a whopping 14.7. inches of rain in one 24 hr. period. Up here in the GWN, we’re presently experiencing a January thaw.




The other news which kind of floored me is that, after only seven months on the air, talk show host Conan O’Brian in off the Tonight Show and Jay Leno is resuming his late night spot in March. Last Friday was Conan's last night. I think O’Brien is a good writer, but he just didn’t pull in the big numbers for the 11:30 PM slot. His severance pay? Over $40 Million! I’m not exactly sure what happened but I had heard that Leno’s 10 PM show wasn’t doing well. I had no idea Conan was bombing as well. I’m a Letterman fan. As far as I‘m concerned, this makes NBC look stupid … again. $40 Million for seven months ... yikes!When I think back to the Letterman debacle, when he was passed over for the Tonight Show, it looks like something is rotten in Burbank. Oh well, on to the next entertainment road kill.



In politics, the honeymoon is over, and one year in, President Obama is fighting for his political life. Pundits are saying that last week’s Massachusetts vote to elect Republican Scott Brown to fill Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat was a clear message that voters are dissatisfied with President Obama’s performance, and that they want him to focus more on job creation than health care reform. A Republican in Kennedy’s seat changes the mix and could scuttle the health care bill, not that I understand anything relating to politics. I not at all surprised that some of that Partisan-Pelosi-we-can-fix-everything-those-greedy-self-serving-Republicans-messed-up” arrogance is beginning to evaporate. As I predicted, the very voters who deified this relative neophyte are beginning to turn on him like a pack of wolves. So much for a fresh start in Washington. Still, it is with no particular satisfaction that I watch yet another starry-eyed politician fall into the quagmire of a Washington political system which seems to have more checks than balances. I’m disgusted with both parties right now, and I can’t see us digging out from this mess in my lifetime.

I'm a little late getting this week's report out, and now we are experiencing a mini blizzard. So much for the January thaw! 
 
Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 1/18/10

This morning I woke up to a DJ on the radio informing me that today, the third Monday in January, is officially dubbed “Blue Monday”, so proclaimed by some expert because it is statistically determined to be the most depressing day of the year. It’s winter, it’ dreary, the holidays are over, the bills are piling up, etc. etc. Funny, I didn’t feel the pain, and believe me, I'm extremely receptive to the winter blues.


When one embarks on that long treacherous journey to build one’s custom dream home, cost overruns are a given. A developer friend of mine once quipped that he could build a perfectly good $300,000 house, for $450,000 … if he was careful. One of our many cost overruns was for electrical service. I remember that, after the demolition of our old cottage, we had only gas generators for several months until the new service was installed. Because we were living on site in the beginning stages of construction, the first sound we heard every morning when the workers arrived was the sound of those gas generators firing up. Eventually, Hydro One, as they call the electrical utility up here in the Great White North, came in and provided us with a proper electrical service, and therein began our first series of “surprises.” First, we found out that we required an enormous amount of electricity to power the lap pool in the basement. That required a beefed up service which, of course, costs more. Ca-ching ca-ching. Then, an unscrupulous electrician charged us about four times too much to run what amounted to a big extension cord to our trailer from the electrical panel, leading us to wonder for what else he’d overcharged. His theory seemed to be that we were building a large house, so we could afford to overpay for everything. This convoluted logic seemed to resurface quite a lot during the construction process. We fired his ass. In came electrician number two, who was more expensive, but the builder assured us this was a cost he would absorb. Long story short, he did not, so this was an added cost associated with bringing electrical service into the new house. There were many other added and unanticipated costs associated with the electricity, some of them the result of things we added.


After the service was in, we started getting monthly Hydro bills, but they seemed awfully low. We read the meter every month, but the bills were always the same, and always very low. Shauna assumed we just had a very energy efficient house, but I knew that one day we were in for a big surprise. Last month we got an electric bill more in line with what I expected to pay, and this month, we got walloped with an enormous bill. It turns out that Hydro One had made a big mistake which had something to do with how they calculate kilowatt hours from the meter. They had been vastly undercharging us for over two years, and I was afraid that they would try and recoup all their lost revenue. Thankfully, they did not, but they did back charge us to when they discovered the discrepancy, in early August. In short, we just got five months worth of our actual electrical cost sent to us in one big January bill. Happy New Year! Still, it could have been much worse. We had electrical heaters going in the house for the better part of two winters, and then add on all all the electrical costs associated with construction to boot, none of which is included in this bill. Hydro is sending us figures on what our real costs should have been during the period in question, while assuring us that they have eaten that cost. I’m so gun shy from all the surprises that I still don’t fully believe they will forgive this debt. By the way, if you call Hydro to inquire about your bill, good luck understanding the explanation. The formula for computing your usage is so confusing, with so many different variables, multipliers, and charges, it is almost impossible to figure out what you should be paying.

I could not believe the devastation caused by that big earthquake in Haiti last Tuesday. They are still digging out from all the bodies and rubble, and the video I‘ve seen is shocking. All those collapsed buildings … and estimates of one hundred thousand or more casualties … that’s such a huge number! Apparently, there is little regulation on building construction in Haiti, and many buildings were not built properly to withstand a substantial earthquake. Perhaps San Francisco would have fared better. I’m not sure anything would have prevented the destruction caused by an almost direct hit Magnitude 7 earthquake. So far America has committed $100 Million in aid, but that doesn’t include private donations. Didn’t Haiti get nailed badly during the last hurricane season as well? My heart goes out to those people.



Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 1/11/10

Because it gets pretty cold up here in the Great White North, proper winter apparel is essential. Even Jasper needs winter clothing. A lot of people don’t think their dogs need to keep warm, and while this is true for some breeds, Miniature Schnauzers get cold. I made a jacket for our last dog, fashioned out of polar fleece in the colors of the Canadian flag, but that coat doesn’t quite fit Jasper. Now she’s wearing a lovely little hand knit (not my me) ensemble when she goes outside. The big problem is keeping her paws warm. Her paws are very sensitive ice, snow and salt, and when it gets really cold, she simply sits down in the snow and picks up one paw in protest. When we were walking her around in Toronto, there was also a lot of salt, and salt really stings a dog's paws. Jasper does not like to wear boots. I bought her a pair of “MuttLucks”, which are the industry standard in K-9 winter footwear. They were the right size, but no matter how tightly I put them on, they kept coming off. I should say, she kicked them off. She’d stand in one position and kick her back legs out until they flew off. I tried cutting up small balloons and wrapping those around her paws, because someone told me those work. They didn’t. I even hand made a pair, but those were useless as well. Finally, we found a pair, at Wal-Mart of all places, that fit and stayed on. She’s much happier now when she walks in the snow, although it is still very difficult to put them on her. As soon as she sees them, she hides under the dining room table, where she knows I can’t reach her, and when I do manage to coral her, she is completely un co-operative. The other day, I noticed that the pads on two of these boots had worn through, so I bought a small piece of leather to patch them. The patch made those two boots stiffer, and now, when she walks around in them, they make loud clapping noise. It’s pretty funny to see her clomping around the house in these things, but they really do help. Last year, when I volunteered at the Kearney dogsled races, I noticed that many of the sled dogs wear booties. I can just imagine Jasper as a sled dog.




When it gets down in the minus digits, I too don the heavy artillery. I wear my long johns, I own several good winter coats, and I have two, count ‘em two, trooper hats. Those are the funny hats with the flaps that come down over your ears. The first hat is made of some synthetic wool substitute, and I wear that one when the mercury drops into the single digits. The second one is leather, lined with genuine Pica fur (nobody’s thrown blood at me yet, but I’m sure the day will come), and that hat is good to forty below. These trooper hats are pretty silly looking when one wears them with the flaps down, but they’re even sillier when, as I do, one wears them with the flaps half down. In Buffalo, I found an army navy store that sold orange ones, and one year I bought them as gifts for all my friends. Nothing says “I care” like a bright orange vinyl trooper hat. Gloves are another story. Although I have a lot of pairs of gloves, but with gloves you sacrifice dexterity for warmth. Despite all the hoopla about Thinsulate, I have yet to find a thin glove which keeps my hands warm. Mitts are better, but then you really sacrifice dexterity. As for boots, I like the felt-lined snowmobile style boots, because they’re good in the deep snow. We bought a pair for my father-in-law the other day, but he finds them difficult to put on and take off. Any way you slice it, winter’s a big pain in the butt.



Body scanners in the airports? I suppose it’s not a bad idea. I certainly don’t agree with all those civil libertarian hose heads who claim this violates our rights to privacy. I maintain that one loses some of those rights when one elects to go out in public. If you wish to blow yourself up in your own home, without endangering the general population, go right ahead. Still, I’m not so sure these body scanners are going to solve the problem. When somebody figures out a way to scan for malevolent intent, then maybe we’ll be safer. Until then, I think we’re s-o-l.

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2010 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 1/12/10

I'm the prisoner of low technology right now ... We are reduced to dial up service and to boot, I'm using a very old, slow, laptop computer. I wrote this week's report on my new laptop, and the word processing program will not read on this obsolete computer...

We are in a no man's land here in Katrine for internet accessibility - weak cell service and no DSL. I suppose we'll need to go to satellite but haven't yet.

I'll have to drive around looking for a wireless signal before I can post the report. Sorry about that.

Gone ice fishing, be back soon!

Jamie

The Oppenheimer Report 1/4/10

Happy New Year one and all! This New Year’s Eve, I followed the long line of cars heading up to cottage country from Toronto, and joined Shauna and her parents for a sumptuous feast at Jasper Bark Lodge. I even made it to the beer store in Huntsville five minutes before they closed for the holiday. New Year’s Eve without a sparkling malt beverage would have been a disaster. Not that we were completely without bubbly; I’d picked up a bottle of sparkling wine in Toronto (I prefer a decent sparkling wine to cheap champagne, and good champagne is way too pricey for a cheapskate like me). After dinner, we listened to the sometimes amusing banter of Anderson Cooper and Kathy Gifford, hosting CNN’s live coverage of the ball drop in Times Square. I used to watch Dick Clark‘s “Rockin’ New Year‘s Eve, but after Dick had a stroke, and that Ryan Seafoam guy took over, I lost interest..Frankly, all of the people involved with that American Idol show are a little dysfunctional. For some reason I can’t put into words, Seafoam irks me.


Brief anecdote about sparkling beverages … I remember that when I was about 11 or 12 years old, I celebrated New Year’s Eve at a friend’s house in Buffalo. It was a sleep over, there were four of us, and the big excitement was that we were permitted to drink Cold Duck, a very cheap substitute for champagne, to celebrate. I suppose the hosting parents presumed that, because we were confined to one room in the house, we couldn’t get into too much trouble. Clearly neophytes in the art of drinking, we did everything wrong. We drank much too fast (Cold Duck tastes like soda pop … and sweet, carbonated alcohol is a bad combination), and we drank much too much. To cinch the deal, we dined exclusively on potato chips and junk food, and ate nothing substantial or nutritious. By the time America’s Oldest Living Teenager was barking out the final countdown, all of us were quite inebriated, and one of us became very sick, projectile vomiting all over the T.V. room. It was like a scene from The Exorcist. Three of us managed to hold our liquor, but this one putz really drove the bus to barf town. As he wretched and gagged, and as gobs of drool streamed down off his beet red face, we had to endure an endless medly of “I’M DYING … I NEED TO GO TO THE HOSPITAL BECAUSE I’M DYING … HELP ME, I’M DYING!” I must have heard him say that a hundred times before he finally shut up and passed out, still breathing very well I might add. The whole episode lasted perhaps ten minutes tops, during which the rest of us tried desperately to avoid the omnipresent and multi-directional backsplash. I and the host then spent the next two hours washing up this mob hit of puke. What a buzz kill! Most of it ended up in the victim’s sleeping bag, but a fair amount reached remote corners of the room. I learned some important lessons about drinking that New Year’s Eve. First of all, nothing will sober you up faster than the smell of barf. If you do barf, you should definitely be made to clean up after yourself. Finally, stay away from Cold Duck, that stuff is deadly. As for wretched excess, I’m still working on that lesson. Though there have been other stories about drinking in excess, that was the first and most memorable.


Right now (New Year‘s Day), I’m sitting at the picture window writing this report on my new laptop and watching the snow-covered lake and the storm brewing to the south. The weather has been mild this week, but we’re expecting a cold snap, and with it some lake effect streamers. Today, the news guys are reviewing the events of 2009 … Bernie Madoff the scam artist, the death of Michael Jackson and other celebrities, and of course, the devastating fallout from the downturn in the economy. And this was the year my Dad finally passed away. As I approach my fifty-fifth year, and I think back to the changes I’ve seen since my first memories in the mid-1950’s, I wonder what it must have been like to have been born in 1910 and to have watched the events of the past 98 years unfold. Good luck with your resolutions, and let‘s hope that 2010 is better than 2009..




Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2009 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED