The Oppenheimer Report 6/30/14

Photo by Shauna Leigh Taylor

Today’s imponderable question is: Why do any electrical appliances require AAA batteries? They are, in my opinion, a particularly annoying battery. One can find the larger AAs in most stores, but the smaller AAAs are harder to find. Go to any Wal Mart or Canadian Tire in Canada, and the AA’s will be everywhere, but the AAA’s are sold out or not available in the larger economy packages. Also, they are generally more expensive than the AAs, which makes absolutely no sense. We use them in our little OFF mosquito replelling clip on machines, which work pretty well by the way. Several of our LED flashlights use them as well. We go through a lot of batteries in this household. As for rechargeable batteries, fuggetabotit. I have yet to find a rechargeable battery that is worth the powder to blow it away, which is a shame, because it would certainly lessen the battery disposal problem in the world. We have a couple rechargeable portable vacuum cleaners and they are relatively useless. I replaced the large cylinder-shaped batteries in one of my dust busters with what I believed were higher quality nickel metal hydride batteries, but they did not hold a charge any better than the original crappy nickel cadmium batteries. The only rechargeable batteries I have found somewhat useful are the lithium ions I use in my power tools, but so far I have not found rechargeable lithium ion batters available in AA or AAA size. I just bought a cordless weed whacker with a lithium ion battery and it works pretty well. With this new cordless job, I can go up our long driveway and tame some of the dense overgrowth that seems worse than ever this year.

We had a rainstorm a few weeks ago that flooded our property. The newly installed sump pump in our basement pumps at 25 gallons per minute, and it was going strong for well over an hour. Used to be that the rainstorms were soaking rains, good for the vegetation, but lately the rains have been hard and fast. When they come that fast they wash out the roads and flood the lawn before the water can absorb into the soil. Yesterday there were pop up thunderstorms, and one or two of them were quite severe. One minute it was blowing hard and pouring buckets, and five minutes later it was calm and sunny. Today I heard there was a tornado that touched down in nearby Burk’s Falls. I’ve always had a morbid fascination with tornadoes. I wish could see one in person, from a safe distance of course. I feel for the residents in Brandon, Manitoba who have been inundated with floods from excessive rain. But before all you AL Gore supporters tell me this is all because of our excessive carbon footprint, I think weather patterns are cyclical, and this would probably happen whether man was here to screw up the environment or not. I doubt any industrialized country will ever comply with the directives of Kyoto, or any other voluntary agreement to cut back on greenhouse gases, but it probably would not make much difference anyhow. To understand why weather change is impacting us more now than it did say 100 years ago, look at how our populations have swelled. So many people live so close to the ocean. I watched an interesting documentary on Hurricane Sandy the other night, and did not realize that the southern end of Manhattan is landfill. No wonder it flooded. Enough about the weather.   

There is a local record label up here called Tree Ring Records, actually more of a loosely based consortium of area musicians, and it has been instrumental (excuse the pun) in releasing the albums of some of our local artists. It’s a grassroots kind of thing, designed to promote local talent, and, hand in hand with Huntsville’s musician-friendly Hunter’s Bay Radio, it has been successful giving some exposure to musicians who might not otherwise be heard. And, as I have said before, there is A LOT of local talent up here.  My friend Sean Cotton is one of several founding members of Tree Ring, and the other day he did me the honor of inviting me to participate in a summer series of song writers showcases. I and my fellow songwriters will be performing at 4 local venues from Sundridge on the North side down to Bracebridge on the south end, throughout July and August. It’s called Tree Ring Tuesdays, and while I’m skeptical that this will draw any kind of large audience, I welcome the opportunity to play my tunes on a stage with some of my fellow songwriters. It is also a chance for me to develop my anemic performing skills. As I said, it is and always has been my goal to “go plywood” in Burk’s Falls, and I am in the process of forming my entourage now. Happy Canada Day to my Canadian friends and a Happy Fourth of July to my fellow yanks stateside.

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 6/23/14

Shauna and I with Lake Louise in the background

I came across a picture the other day that made me laugh out loud. As some of my twelve loyal readers know, my wife Shauna and I used to travel out to Banff, Alberta at the end of May. We spent part of our honeymoon there, and we liked the town and its residents. As well, Banff is a great home base for hundreds of spectacular day hikes in the Canadian Rockies. After a few years we began to be treated like locals, and we made some good friends with whom we still keep in touch. The trip was therapeutic on many levels; certainly it was good for our souls, but as well, for Shauna it was also a partial respite from her chronic pain. There is something about living at a higher altitude that took away some of her myofascial pain, and every year, with every hundred feet we would climb, heading west out of Calgary into the mountains, there would be an audible sigh of relief from my long-suffering passenger. We never really figured out why this happened, but Shauna became markedly more energetic in the high altitudes, and within a week or so after our arrival, we were able to hike and exercise much more than we could back east. Because we stayed for a while, and because we never travel light, we drove out every season, and that drive was sublime for me. Escaping from the fist-clenching congestion of Toronto, where it took me almost 45 minutes to commute the 12 miles to my workplace, I was like a teapot letting off steam as soon as we got into to open reaches of Northern Ontario. From Kenora to Calgary, we were on the open road, and it was always an adventure. What is it about long road trips?

One day, we were in some restaurant, in Canmore, Alberta I believe, and there next to the main entrance was a large Plexiglas box filled with stuffed animals. The catch was that the animals were in little plastic containers, so you did not know what you were getting until it was too late to change. For a loonie, you took your chances. We got a monkey. There is a Peter Gabriel song I like called Shock the Monkey and Shauna used to joke about how she thought the song was actually called Spank the Monkey. I suppose some of you know what that expression means. Bopping the baloney, shaking hands with the unemployed … you get the picture. Of course, our little furry white mascot became “Spank” the monkey, and hanging from the rear view mirror of our Jeep, Spank accompanied us on our travels across Canada that summer. He was an endless source of amusement. We did horrible things to that monkey. At one point, I had his tail sticking diagonally up between his legs and taped in that position, so he looked as if he had a giant boner. People would walk by the car in a parking lot and do a double take. Rather an interesting departure from the fuzzy dice concept.  

I found a picture of Spank the other night, dangling from the rear view mirror with his enormous erection, and in the background were the Canadian Rockies. It made me chuckle, it reminded me of lofty mountain vistas Shauna and I shared and of the many adventures we experienced in Banff, Yoho, and Kootney parks. Spank the monkey reminded me how important it is to laugh and to explore.

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 6/16/14

From the collection of  D. Jordan Taylor

Perhaps this sobriety thing is paying off, because I have finally been motivated to do something I promised myself a long time ago I would do. Although I’ve been writing songs and making rough demos of songs now for well over 30 years, I have never really had the motivation or courage to record a proper album of songs. Life got in the way, and I always had an excuse to put it off before. As well, when one puts one’s art out there and it is rejected, it can be devastating. It is a challenge to believe in myself when so many people in the industry told me I was no good. I chased other artists to cover my songs, and that didn’t work. I submitted my songs to publishing companies, and that was actually destructive. While I expected and welcomed constructive criticism, some of the rejection letters I received were just plain stupid. I very much doubt many of the recipients even listened to the obligatory 30 seconds required to pass judgment, before tossing my tape in the circular file. I submitted my favorite songs to song contests, hoping that one of the featured celebrity judges might hear one of them and see some merit in my ability as a songwriter. This was not only expensive, but also demoralizing. I’d wait expectantly for some indication that someone in the industry had even heard one of my songs, only to be informed in some form letter that my songs were not being considered. No feedback, no proof anyone even listened to them, just “No.” Then, I’d listen to the songs that won the contest and I’d feel as if I’d been cheated. Some of those songs were simply horrible in my opinion. Like so many others, I finally gave up trying to interest anyone in my work, after trying for over a decade. But I never stopped writing songs.

 

Now, thirty years later, I am retired from my “day job”, and the music business is much different. With digital technology and the internet, it is less expensive to reach an audience than it used to be, and artists are no longer prisoners to a myopic and ageist music industry. Also, I am now in a unique environment that fosters and encourages creativity. As of two weeks ago, I have laid down bed tracks for 7 songs and with my gifted producer Juan Barbosa, we have so far completed three finished songs. I love what Juan has done with my songs, and I feel so fortunate to have found a guy who is at once so talented, and who believes in my songs enough to get them right. I know my limits as a performer, but I feel the songs are strong, and I am proud of what Juan has done with them. It is remarkable what can be done to a song by a good musician and producer. I am now almost a third of the way to accomplishing what I set out to do, and I will never again let another’s judgment quash my ambition or creativity. When the album is done, I will put it out there for anyone who cares to listen (even if it is just the twelve of you), and if it falls flat, I’m OK with that. I gave it my best shot, and I can’t disappoint myself if I give it my all. I am so happy to have been embraced with such open arms by this talented and generous Muskoka music community. Regardless of what others may determine, I have spilled some of my blood into these sound recordings, and for the first time in my life, I feel as if I have achieved one of my main goals in life. And I am proud of that. Thank you Juan, from the bottom of my heart, for getting this right. I hope to have a completed album of songs by September/ October. My next goal is to "go plywood" in Burk's Falls. Wish me luck.

Speaking of the music business, the legendary Top 40 DJ Casey Kasem has died at 82. May he rest in peace; sounds like his last few years were a little rocky. I used to enjoy his show.  

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report - 6/9/14

With reference to our recent road trip to Connecticut for my 40^th reunion, I forgot to mention that we had a hotel adventure. We were booked into the hotel where the majority of my classmates were staying in Southbury, Conn. There was a block of rooms set aside for Taft reunion attendees and, as we had Jasper in tow, we booked a “pet friendly” room. We did not arrive at the hotel until around 2AM, and when I picked up the key to our room, I realized that there was no way to get to that room without using stairs. With Jasper we had a lot of stuff to unpack from the car, and now we could not use a cart to transport it to our room. Strike one. The room was a dump, but at 2AM, I figured I would take it up with management later. Particularly troubling was the water damaged ceiling in the bathroom. Strike two. When we woke up, I drove in to town to pick up some supplies at the supermarket, and while I was gone, the next door neighbors from hell started screaming at each other and woke Shauna up. With their two completely undisciplined, screaming children and two yappy dogs (who made Jasper look like an angel, which she is not), this was turning into a rather abominable experience. Strike three. Shauna and I actually began to laugh because it was becoming so ridiculous. We reasoned we would be out of the room for much of the stay, and thought that we could live with the hassles. But the straw that broke the camel’s back was that, while Shauna was getting ready to go out, someone in the room directly above us decided to take a shower, and when they did, water began pouring down on poor Shauna as she sat on the throne. That was the deal breaker. We called the front desk, who sent over what I can only assume was a mentally challenged maintenance man to assess the situation. I presumed that, after he surveyed the damage, we would be moved into a more suitable room. Instead, the maintenance man came back with some plastic sheeting and duct tape to divert the water away from the toilet. Not exactly what we had in mind! I calmly went to the manager and explained all that had transpired, perhaps intimating that I was one of those undisclosed internet hotel critics. Ultimately, we were moved to a much nicer section of the hotel, overlooking a lovely river and with no noisy neighbors, and the room was free of charge. Shauna was happy, Jasper was happy, but I would have gladly paid for the acceptable room I’d booked in the first place.

The yin and the yang of summer. I love warm weather, but now that it's tee shirt season, up here in the Great White North it is also biting insect season. Actually, May through October is bug season up here, but beginning a couple weeks ago, the starting gun went off for black flies and mosquitos. During the spring and summer in Canada these insects are omnipresent, and their presence is both loathed and celebrated. Somewhere I believe near Ignace in Western Ontario there used to be a large statue erected of a man being carried away by a giant mosquito. I don’t think there is any repellant that really works for the black flies, which are tiny little creatures, but which leave one helluvah an annoying welt when they bite. Mesh bug suits are somewhat effective, and at this time of year I wear a mesh cover over my head at dusk and dawn. Thankfully, black fly season is relatively short and that plague usually abates by July when the weather gets hot. Mosquitos, on the other hand, are always here when the weather warms up. We have larvicide for our retention pond and rain barrels, vitamin B patches as an alternative to poisonous DEET spray, a propane-fired mosquito “vacuum” which may or may not work,  a battery-powered clip on OFF bug repellant diffuser (which we find is also fairly effective), citronella candles, bug zappers, flame throwers … we’ve got it all, and I am still being eaten alive. This year the general consensus is that the mosquitos are worse than usual. I bought a bug book and I am learning all about them. There are some decent home remedies for the bites. Surprisingly, hand sanitizer works pretty well. Ammonia mixed with rubbing alcohol also seems to help, and is a lot cheaper than “After Bite”. My favorite mosquito weapon is those electric bug zapper racquets. Very satisfying. The other day there were a bunch of the bastards in my car when I left for town, and I almost drove into a tree because I was so distracted zapping them. You hear about not using your cell phone in a car, but I might be the first person to get in trouble for using a bug zapper.

Speaking of annoying insects, later this week Ontario elects a new Premier. Will it be the status quo?

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 6/2/14

The "courting" phase

Presently we have Shauna’s mom up here at the lake house with us. We picked her up on our return from the Taft reunion in Connecticut and rescued her from her 24-7 caregivers for a week. This has turned into a longer stay than we’d originally intended, because we wanted Ethel to be here for our 20^th wedding anniversary. Twenty years ago last Thursday Ethel and my father-in-law Syd made a wedding for Shauna and me that was decidedly the best one I’ve ever attended. Of course I am biased. It was a big wedding, held at the Royal York Hotel in Toronto, and many friends and family from both sides were in attendance. While much of the ceremony was a blur, I do remember Shauna looking like a white cloud floating down that aisle, and I remember the great band Shauna picked (she has great taste in music) for the reception. It was Guido Basso and his big band and boy, did they rock the house. The music, the food, the speeches were all fantastic and the night could not have been a better celebration. One of the best parts about our wedding was that friends and family came from across North America to share it with us. Syd and Ethel made that beautiful wedding for us, and I think it is fitting that the only one remaining parent between Shauna and me should be with us to acknowledge its 20^th anniversary. Too many of the attendees of that wedding are now gone.

We drove down to Bracebridge and had quiet dinner at a restaurant Shauna and I like, overlooking the Muskoka River. We were served dinner by someone whom I do not think had ever waitressed before, but had a lovely meal nonetheless. We took the obligatory selfie outside the restaurant with Shauna’s mom, then headed back up to Katrine. It was hardly the grandiose celebration of the original event, but an appropriate one nonetheless. No marriage is perfect, and Shauna and I have sometimes stumbled over the years. Relationships are hard, and anyone who tells you what is the “right thing to do” to keep a marriage on track had better have been married for thirty or forty years before they call themselves and expert. I am sure there will be other bumps in the road, but what I have slowly come to realize is that this woman is in many ways my foundation. She has seen me at my best and at my worst. We have spent most of the last 20 years in each other’s company, and we have shared a lot of our life so far. She knows me as well if not better than I know myself and certainly better than anyone else in my life knows me. She accepts who I am (although grudgingly when it comes to my chronic messiness) and she loves me, even when I fail. For all those things I love her. She has been my muse these past twenty years, and I doubt I would have proposed marriage in a song to any other woman.

A few weeks ago I walked in to a jewelry store in Hunstville and ordered a custom designed necklace with a pendant which will be meaningful to Shauna. It will be made out of platinum, and it will be my 20^th anniversary gift to her. The pendant will be engraved on the back, but I’m not yet sure what I will say; perhaps something like “Happy 20^th to my Shauna Leigh, and here’s to however many more years we have left together.”

 

A YEAR AGO I DIDN’T KNOW, DIDN’T HAVE A CLUE WHO I WAS WAITING FOR

PASSING TIME IMPERFECT RHYMES, DIDN’T HAVE A CLUE WHO I WAS WRITING FOR/

 

cho: AND I’M TELLING YOU I LOVE YOU, AND I’M ASKING YOU TO PLEASE CONSIDER ME.

     OH PLEASE PLEASE SHAUNA LEIGH WILL YOU MARRY ME?

 

THAT FIRST NIGHT ON THE TELEPHONE, SITTING IN MY BEACH HOUSE ALL ALONE

I LISTENED TO YOUR DISTANT VOICE, AND SOMEHOW I JUST KNEW THAT YOU WOULD BE THE ONE

 

cho: AND I’VE WAITED OH SO VERY LONG, BUT I FINALLY FOUND THE RIGHT WORDS IN A SONG, OH PLEASE PLEASE SHAUNA LEIGH  WILL YOU MARRY ME?

 

I CAN’T TELL YOU WHAT THE FUTURE HOLDS, BUT TOGETHER WE’LL EXPLORE THAT OPEN ROAD, SO I’M HOPING YOU’LL SAY “YES” SHAUNA LEIGH …. WILL YOU MARRY ME?

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 5/26/14

When Shauna, Jasper and I drove down to Connecticut for my 40^th reunion at Taft

last weekend we decided to take the scenic route. It was not the most direct route, which would have taken us down the always congested and annoying Hwy 400, through Toronto commuter traffic, and down the even more vexing QEW to the Buffalo Peace Bridge. That bridge has become a bigger and bigger headache, and because it was a holiday weekend in Canada, it was bound to be a longer than usual wait. Instead, we travelled east across Hwy 60 from nearby Huntsville towards Ottawa, then made our border crossing at Ogdansburg, N.Y. along the St Lawrence Seaway, and headed southeast through the eastern half of New York State. Eventually we made our way southeast along country highways, through Massachusetts and down through Connecticut. It was Shauna’s suggestion and I am glad we did it this way, because while it added an hour or so to our journey, it made the ride much more enjoyable. On top of avoiding all the dreaded Ontario highways and the Toronto traffic, we missed the mind numbing journey across ¾ of the New York State Thruway. More and more these days I am all about the journey, and trying to make every moment count. Why not use the destination as an opportunity to explore parts of the map neither of us had ever been? Of course we got lost once or twice, usually due to a GPS glitch. At one point we were travelling through a little town near the Adirondacks, and I knew we were going in the right direction, but that friggin’ TomTom lost its mind and told us to make a U- turn. We stopped and turned around in the driveway of some mean looking tattooed guy who was sitting out on his front lawn, and visions of the “squeal like a pig” scene in Deliverance went running through my head. As his wolf-like dog trotted toward our car to see what was for dinner, I gunned the car and we took off in a cloud of dust. Note to self: never ask a guy for directions who is filing his nails with a rasp. “Come on inside Elmer, the KFC is on the table and yer gonna miss Honey Boo Boo!”

We travelled through Watertown, N.Y. which is a place I have always wanted to visit. Because of its location on the business end of Lake Ontario, Watertown experiences some of the most ridiculous snowstorms in all of New York State. One winter not too long ago, Watertown got dumped on with so much snow- something like seven feet in less than a week - that I think they had to call in the military to dig out the town. Perhaps because I hail from a snow-belt city notorious for having endured some serious snowstorms, I have a morbid pre-occupation with severe winter weather. Last Wednesday I performed some songs in my second Hunter’s Bay Radio interview in Huntsville, and I could not resist playing one of my whiney Buffalo winter songs Cabin Fever. Hey, I write about what I know. That one was a big hit in Burk’s Falls when I played it at a recent “coffee house” gig. Certainly the residents up here can relate.

This Thursday Shauna and I will have been married for 20 years. I could not put this anniversary into perspective until I realized that my best man Bob’s daughter was born shortly before our wedding, and she just turned 20. It blows me away.

 

GRAIN ELEVATORS AND TUMBLEWEEDS

MILES OF NOTHING BUT LIVESTOCK AND FEED

WHEN WE TRAVEL IT SETS ME FREE

I LOVE TO SEE THESE PLAINS SURROUNDING ME

 

IN A ROOM WHERE PEOPLE WALK AROUND

SOME WALK IN AND SOME WALK OUT

WE SEE THE MOTION BUT WE HEAR NO SOUND

WE GET SO LOST IN THE TIME WE FOUND

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

 

 

 

 

The Oppenheimer Report 5/20/14

With Roger Stacey (center) - photo by Shauna Leigh Taylor

I apologize to my twelve loyal readers that this week’s report is a day late, but we just returned from a road trip to the States, and I did not have the opportunity to write yesterday. Last Thursday, Shauna, Jasper and I headed down to Watertown, Connecticut to attend my 40^th reunion at The Taft School, and I am so happy she was able to join me for this momentous event. While I’m not entirely sure she was thrilled about the 13 hour drive down, it was important that she accompany me on this important milestone occasion, and she was a good sport. This reunion meant she was introduced to a bunch of complete strangers, and that can be off putting, but she handled it with grace and charm.

 Some of you may recall my Oppenheimer Report recollections of the 35^th reunion back in 2009, wherein I expressed my trepidation about returning to face my peers after so many years away from the school. 2009 was not a banner year for me, and I felt that perhaps the majority of my classmates had accomplished far more in their lives than had I. Maybe they had, I don’t know. Success is an elusive concept to me, and class reunions underscore the ambiguity of the term. Are we successful because we earn a lot of money? I have not. Are we successful because we successfully raise children? Again, I have not, although Shauna and I have a good marriage, and will celebrate our 20^th Anniversary in nine days. But I have started to let myself off the hook about this. After the 35^th I realized that life is a kick in the ass for everyone, and it is how we deal with adversity that shapes us. I know that I have tried hard to be a good person and to do right by my parents and friends, and I am confident that I am still growing.  I like the man I am today better than the man I was five years ago, and I see great potential for my future.

I take pride in feeling I was the motivating influence to get some of my more reluctant classmates to attend this reunion, and I was delighted to reunite with them. Several I have not seen or heard from in 40 years. One classmate said it best: we all look different – some more than others - but the eyes are the same. The personalities that drew me to my friends are still intact, despite the ravages of time and circumstance, and it was comforting to know these people whom I have not seen in so long are still my friends. Especially in a boarding school, as fellow inmates, I and my classmates shared some life-changing experiences. It is an unexpected pleasure to discover that I enjoy the company of some classmates I did not know in school. High school is an awkward time for most of us, and given the passage of time I found myself more open to friendship with these people with whom I had not associated in school. After all, we did share our adolescence together.

I would be remiss if I did not mention that I had the opportunity to see and visit with my favorite English teacher at Taft. He was certainly one of the reasons I love to write and aspire to persevere and improve my writing skills. He is also a reminder to me how important education is to a child’s future. Although a child of privilege, I was a handful at 16, and I could easily have fallen off the tracks had I not been steered in a better direction. Without knowing it, and simply by being a strong role model and a good teacher, Roger Stacey guided me towards something I love to do, and I will be forever in his debt for that. While I never made my living as a writer, it has been and is something I will always love to do, and I feel confident that it is one of the things that sustains me in my moments of self-doubt.       

Finally, and on that last subject, I got to talking with one of my classmates who has written a self-help book called Gumptionade (www.gumptionade.com).  Not unlike me, he had a spiritual crisis a while back, and writing that book was perhaps his pro-active solution to that existential struggle. We talked about “good” suffering and “bad” suffering, and that was meaningful to me. Good suffering is therapy, and the general pursuit of self-awareness, while an example of bad suffering is self-medication. Having recently quit booze, I understood that. I intend to read his book soon. Getting back to that elusive concept of success, perhaps that is what success has become for me. I have begun to focus on something I love to do, and that has had a ripple effect in other aspects of my life. I communicate better, which means I am able to purge my sometimes toxic thoughts and emotions before they consume me (bad suffering). I am writing better songs, and with a little luck, I might even achieve some of that elusive recognition I so craved when I began that journey. Regardless, it will always be the journey which sustains me. To all the classmates at Taft whom I have come to know, thank you for your friendship. Keep in touch, and I hope to see you again soon!!

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  

The Oppenheimer Report -5/12/14

The other day I opened up my email and there was a Facebook message from a friend encouraging me to sign a petition boycotting the “I Hate Dogs” Facebook page. There’s a Facebook page devoted to people who hate dogs?  Wow. Of course, I had to see for myself, and the page looks like more of a joke than a serious statement. The above and profanely amusing photograph was “shared” from this page. Hey,  I love dogs, and most animals for that matter, and I abhor the mistreatment of any animal; but while it is bad taste and maybe even a bit disgusting that there is a page that professes to hate animals, is it something we should prohibit? I’m no civil liberties zealot, and I understand the indignation that a Facebook page like this might generate, but come on, maybe this is not our biggest problem. It reminds me of Nancy Reagan with her infamous war on drugs. That ill-conceived campaign took the focus off hard drugs,  was a colossal waste of money, and had no appreciable success at stemming the proliferation of hard drugs in North America. At one point during the Reagan years, a New Yorker could be put away in prison for life, simply for possessing a bag of weed, and that is just a stupid waste of money.  As I said, I went to the Facebook page to see if the so called dog haters have crossed any lines, but it looked more pro dog than anti dog.  There are a lot of kooks using social media; are we going to ban them all? Good luck. While even the implication of hatred may not be a healthy sign for our culture, it’s a free country, right?  I hate Barney the Dinosaur, but other than calling him a purple blob of evil, I’ve never acted on my emotions. I think the majority of the haters visiting that page are likely to be dog lovers who want to express their outrage at such ignorance.

Still, there is an awful lot of real hatred out there in the world, and as an international community, I don’t think we’re doing a very good job of addressing it. Yad Vishem, never forget. Post holocaust (which some haters still deny even happened) it has become an underlying reminder, for Jews and everyone else, that hatred can and does spread like wildfire. Never allow a Hitler to rise again, isn’t that the message? Many of us assume such an atrocity could never re-occur in our lifetime, but it has, over and over. Rowanda, the Congo, Pol Pot, the Turks and the Armenians, the Bosnian War, Idi Amin, to name but a few. Madness and evil abound. And then we have that NBA bozo Donald Sterling, owner of the Clippers, admonishing his young girlfriend for associating with Black men.  As hard as it is for me to believe, ignorance and racism are alive and well and flourishing in North America. In general, I think we have done a pretty crappy job of learning from our mistakes. Sadly, hatred and intolerance may be an inextricable part of human nature, but I still believe good, loving parents, or family members, or role models, and proper education ,will go a lot further to combat hatred than will shutting down a Facebook page. Absolutely, shine a light on evil; expose it, teach us the difference between right and wrong, and then let us decide for ourselves how we deal with it. I believe love can catch on like wildfire just as easily as hatred can.  My self righteous rant du jour.

I WATCH THE BOOB TUBE CAUSE I’M A RUBE, I LIKE TO WATCH THE EVENING NEWS

I WATCH THOSE IDIOTS LIGHT THE FUSE AND EVERYONE IS SO CONFUSED

I DON’T SEE THE RAGE ANYMORE

cho:

IF I HAD MERLIN’S WAND, WITH THE WAVE OF MY ARM

I’D BRING THE WHOLE THING  DOWN, AND START IT OVER AGAIN WITH LOVE, I'D START IT AGAIN WITH LOVE.

                                     -   Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c 2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 5/5/14

Gigging at The Barn

Last Saturday night, I attended a get together of local musicians at a friend’s barn, which is in fact called The Barn, and doubles as a living quarters and recording studio in Huntsville. Juan Barbosa invited me to attend and, because I will soon be recording with Juan in this space, I was eager to see what it looks like. Juan told me that local musicians gather here every several months to “let their hair down” and jam with each other, and he said it would be an opportunity for me to mingle with some of the local talent. Digital field recorder in hand, I arrived about two hours into the party. By that time, everyone was sufficiently lubricated, and the music was flowing freely.

It feels a little weird not to be drinking when I’m in a setting like this, but grasping my non-alcoholic beer for courage, I tried not to stand out as the square stranger. I am sure I stuck out like a sore thumb. This was an open stage, and musicians came and went as they felt inspired. It’s my favorite type of performance, musicians playing for musicians, spontaneously jamming and improvising. I really enjoyed what I heard. There was every kind of music, from reggae, to punk, to jazz, hard rock, and country – and most of it was really good. Thankfully, not one of the covers was anything I hear ad nauseam on the radio. Most of these guys are pros, and what is great about pros is that they can play with  anyone. I was fortunate enough to be allowed to get up and play a few of my originals, and although I was clearly out of my league, everyone was gracious and supportive. I wasn’t very good, but the other musicians managed to help me sound better, and I sang my songs to exactly the audience I’d hoped to reach. I was in my glory, and I came off the stage with some new friends and some uplifting compliments about my writing skills. For decades I have been writing in a vacuum, and have played to open mic audiences who are, for the most part, not listening so much as waiting for their turn on stage. Since I moved up here, I have found a vast community of very talented musicians and songwriters who are at once generous, humble, and extremely encouraging. And they actually listen. I have seen very little of the corrosive egoism that plagues many successful artists. I have learned that for every famous musician, there are a thousand unrecognized artists who deserve to be. I know there are these music communities in every town, big or small; I have simply never tapped into one before. Most of my friends and family do not really understand how important songwriting is to me. It’s like an inexplicable little aberration in my being. A little like turret's of the soul, I blurt out these songs, these little whistle stops on my long train ride, and in some ways the songs define me. It is perhaps the one thing I think I do well, and having the opportunity to find an outlet for my creativity has brought me some degree of contentment.

During the four hours I listened to the jams at The Barn, outside it poured torrentially for most of the night. What was a long, muddy, uphill driveway when I drove in was now quicksand. I texted Shauna to inform her that I was heading home, but as I walked toward my car, precariously parked on the side of the drive, I noticed some guys walking up the hill. They told me we needed to get some people together to free a cab. It had become stuck coming up the drive to pick up a couple of inebriated attendees, and it was stuck in the middle of the drive, blocking access or egress. You can imagine what happened next: six or seven drunk guys attempted to push the cab out of the mud, but only succeeded in getting mud-soaked and miring the cab deeper into the muck. A tow truck was called, and I assumed this would  be just a minor delay. I sat in my car as guests stumbled by to pee in the woods, and after about an hour I walked down the drive to find out why I could still see the lights of the cab, and why it had not yet been pulled out. There at the bottom of the hill was the tow truck, halfway up his wheels in mud, also stuck. I got that sinking feeling inside that I might be sleeping in my car that night.  An hour or so more passed, and miraculously, the tow truck guy got himself unstuck and managed to free the cab as well. I begged the tow guy not to leave, until he saw me get out safely. My MDX has all-wheel drive, and with some difficulty, I managed to back down the drive, slowly, avoiding the minefield of soft spots. I made it out, but just try backing down a winding driveway, full of muddy soft spots, in pitch black rain, and you will understand how this might have been a little nerve racking. I doubt anyone made it down in 2-wheel drive. 

The end of the story is that I got home around 4:30AM, a little frazzled, but energized from meeting and listening to a bunch of crazy musicians. Music is probably the one thing in my life that exposes me to a little chaos into my comfortable little world. Saturday night was just such a night. 

-   Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 4/28/14

I always find something about which to chuckle when I open up my Facebook page, and last week, shortly after Easter, it was a black and white photo someone posted of the Easter Bunny holding  two crying children. In much the same way as Santa is frightening to some kids, an adult male wearing a rather realistic and disturbing rabbit’s head and rabbit feet mittens might be terrifying to some little kids. These children probably thought this giant rabbit was Godzilla. I reposted the photo with a note underneath which read: “The Anti-Bunny.” I suspect this will generate some controversy. Perhaps I should start a new tradition in my faith. What do you think of Morty the flesh-eating Chanukah zombie?  Hey, Google Krampus sometime, if you think I’m the only one creating weird holiday mascots.

Had a productive meeting last Monday with a local musician named Juan Barbosa, arguably one of the more talented singer/songwriters in these parts, and I will hopefully be hiring him to record several of my songs. We spent a couple of  hours talking about our respective tastes, referring occasionally to YouTube videos for reference, and I think we are on the same page as to what I hope to achieve. I might be one of the few songwriters out there who does not really want to go out and perform his songs. If Juan can translate some of my rough demos into polished songs, I will have accomplished what I hope to achieve. I simply want to give some of these songs life. I recently finished three demos with Dave Housser at nearby Bay Lake Studio, and while Dave did what he was supposed to do, I came to the realization that it’s time to let professionals take over on the performing side. It’s a learning process. I still want to use my fingernails-on-a-blackboard vocals on at least some of the tracks, but I’ll probably leave most of the music to professionals. I also hope to get my buddy Bobby Cameron back east from Edmonton to record some of my songs this spring/summer. Between Juan, Bobby and perhaps Sean Cotton and some other artists, maybe I can have an album of songs finished by summer’s end. I’m very excited about this project and it has inspired me to go back and finish some songs I tabled a decade ago. All of those songs are constantly rattling around in my head, and occasionally the missing lyric will come to me in the car, or the shower, or at 3AM. I have learned to get the words down on paper or on a tape recorder before they disappear.

Final notes…As I do on a semi-regular basis, I take a look at various news sources to see what’s going on in the world, and this week was a reminder of how much does not make headlines. Never have I been more confused about the information I glean from the internet, and new sources, especially concerning Russia and Syria. As an example, it has been reported that Right Sector gangster groups attacked Ukrainian soldiers in Slavyansk last week, but more and more it looks as if it was pro-Russian Putin thugs trying to make a case for Russia to step in and “restore order.” The Assad regime in Syria is again accused of using chemical weapons against its people. It is difficult to confirm some of these reports because it is so dangerous for reporters to cover these regions. What else. Two months before the World Cup finals are scheduled to begin in Brazil, there were riots in the streets of Rio, sparked by alleged police brutality. Not great press leading up to a world event. A bomb ripped through a Shiite political rally in Bagdad last Friday reportedly killing 28, and someone caught it on video. While I take most of what I find on the internet with a grain of salt, some of this video is undeniably compelling. Short of outlawing all cell phones and computers, I doubt that bad governments can put a lid on this information. The trick is sifting through the spin. Every so often, I take stock of my good fortune and remember to be thankful for my freedom. Sometimes I can’t help feeling the wolf is at the door.

Or is it just the Easter Bunny? - Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

THe Oppenheimer Report 4/21/14

A friend's Great Dane just had pups

The other night I was on my laptop, working out some lyrics for a new song, and as I sometimes do, I brought it upstairs with me to work on before I went to sleep. When I had finished for the night, I turned it off and put it on the floor next to my bed; there was no room on my end table. That was my big mistake. In the middle of the night, as I got up out of bed to answer one of Nature’s ever more frequent calls, I stepped on the laptop. It did not think this was a big problem until later that day, when I tried to turn the laptop on, and the screen looked like bad modern art. Of course I then had a mild freak out, wondering if the whole computer was toast. I am sure many of you have had that nauseating feeling before, suddenly realizing all of the information on your computer might be lost, and wondering if you had all of it backed up (knowing you probably didn’t).

I hooked the laptop up to our television set with an HDMI cable, and sure enough, the computer still worked. Hallelujah! But the screen was a goner. I can get a replacement screen for this laptop (from Dell), but it will take some time to acquire, and with installation, it won’t be cheap.  I have it hooked up to one of our small televisions, and that will suffice for now. You’re never too old to do really stupid things! The experience has reminded me how much I have come to rely on this computer, and I immediately did a current back up of my information so as to be protected should the hard drive fail. I rail on computers all the time, but I am a whiney hypocrite, because I am every bit as much a prisoner to its allures as the next misinformation junkie. That laptop is my filing cabinet for over 3000 photographs, and every song lyric, every letter, every Oppenheimer Report I have written since 1992, email correspondences, invoices, recorded demo songs, legal documents, etc. And I never thought I’d get sucked into the Face Book death star, but I’m there every day (and it’s amazing how many other people are as well). I’m watching my distant nieces and nephews grow up day by day, and with the click of a mouse I can catch up with a high school class mate whom I have not seen or heard from in forty years. Gone are the days when I took the time to compose a well-thought out letter. Now I can fire off some abbreviated and un-retractable “witticism” on the internet, which I later deem to be off the meter on the poor taste scale. Which brings me to my next deep thought: are we not living in a house of cards when so much of our information is “out there” to be stolen and used against us by strangers?

 

I heard on the news the other night that authorities have caught and arrested the hacker responsible for unleashing that much-publicized Heart Bleed virus which so compromised Canada’s online banking and tax filing system. It turns out the culprit was nineteen years old, I believe from the Great Toronto area, and the only reason he got caught is because he was foolish enough not to disguise his distinguishing IP address. His father is a computer guy in the business of data mining, and I guess the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. He must be so proud of his son. This virus had a ripple effect on online banking, online retail, etc. and it means that hundreds of thousands of social insurance numbers, Canada’s equivalent to the U.S social security number, might have been revealed to nefarious third parties. It all reminds me of that prescient movie War Games, wherein a teenager computer whiz almost unleashes WWIII. The specter of identity theft looms ever higher with each one of these cyber breaches and it is a wake-up call to all of us who use computers. Wireless technology, and the omnipresence of the internet in almost every form of commerce, leave us vulnerable to cyber terrorism. Some of us think that if we don’t do our banking or shopping online, we are safe from cyber crime, but if you have a bank account, or a credit card, or a telephone, or any number of other utilities, the horse is probably out of the barn already, and he didn’t look before he leaped. I continue to delude myself that the powers that be have taken proper security precautions to ensure that nothing bad happens, but clearly this latest heartworm thing proves I have my head in the sand. If some enterprising teen can breach allegedly impenetrable security, how many other serious cyber threats are out there in the wings? Our governments for instance.

Final notes … the death toll is now 60 and climbing as rescuers attempt to recover over two hundred missing passengers, most of them high school kids, from that horrific ferry accident off the southwest coast f S. Korea. Looks as if the captain and the crew are largely responsible for the magnitude of the tragedy, and once again I ask, “who’s driving that thing anyway?” Violence continues to spread cross the Ukraine, and The Toronto Raptors managed to do what the Leafs failed to do: make the playoffs. A belated Happy Easter to all my gentile friends, and to all my fellow members of the tribe, Happy Passover. Thankfully Passover is over on Tuesday. Matzo plugs me up big time.

 

       Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

THe Oppenheimer Report 4-14-14

I suppose this story falls into the category of righteous indignation. Last Monday I went to the post office in Burk’s Falls to send in my U.S. tax return, and because I was mailing it from Canada, the IRS recommended I send it by some express service in order to guarantee timely delivery. Everyone knows I’m “thrifty”, so I asked the lady at the desk if a week was enough time to send the package via regular mail. She could not guarantee that in a week’s time my return would arrive in Austin Texas, so I took the rubber band off and sent it by Express Post. Next year my U.S. accountant will be E-filing, and I’ll save twenty bucks, that is if that new heart bleed, or heart worm, or whatever-it’s-called computer virus doesn’t invade my computer and steal all my information, costing me my life’s savings. Still, I am beginning to wonder if the postal service has not finally outlived its usefulness. I’d heard the Canadian postage rates were going up in March, so while at the post office, I inquired as to how much. One would figure a few cents, right? Hah! It now costs $1.20 to send a post card or letter to the United States from Canada, up from what I considered to be an outrageous $1.10. That seems like a big increase to me, but then I was told that it will now cost eighty-five cents to send a letter within Canada, a hike of twenty cents. AND, Canada Post is now talking about cutting back services. WTF!  Almost one dollar for the luxury of having my personal correspondence rerouted to Pago Pago. That actually happened to me once – I had a letter I mailed in Canada, returned to me after almost 6 months, and one of the several postmarks was American Samoa. Apart from signing the listing agreement and the sale contract, we essentially sold our condo down in Florida by fax and email, and those correspondences were almost instantaneous. I am still old fashioned enough to appreciate receiving a hand written letter or post card, although I’m sure most of my friends can’t say the same about a letter from me. My hand writing is illegible. Code breakers could not read my handwriting. I say send written correspondences by fax or email, and send packages by any number of private carriers who clearly understand the laws of competition better than our governments. Today I sent two important letters out, one to Toronto and one to Buffalo, and both of them are covered with five cent stamps to accommodate these exorbitant hikes. Postal rate hikes are annoying, but 30% hikes are bordering on absurd. Thank you Canada Post, may I have another.

In entertainment news, satirist Stephen Colbert will be taking over as host of the CBS 11:30 PM late night slot, replacing the retiring David Letterman in 2015. I always preferred Letterman over Leno, but now it’s time to usher in the new generation. Jimmy Fallon seems to have hit the ground running since replacing Jay Leno, and now former SNL head writer Seth Meyers has taken over Fallon’s old 12:30 AM spot. I think Seth has got some lernin’ to do. By the way, does anyone speak the King’s English anymore? I never feel as old as I do when I watch and listen to contemporary news anchors and talk show hosts. I go, like, it’s not like that big of a deal, and like, I understand that the majority of listeners are probably in their like twenties or thirties, but OMG, like, really? Sometimes Anderson Cooper sounds as if he was a valley girl, and he giggles as if he was a little school kid. Walter Cronkite never giggled. Same with Fallon and Meyers; while they speak in the vernacular of the young, this does not bode well for the future of communication. The kids these days, where’s my Metamucil, dammit?  

Final notes. After a hopeful week in the search for Malaysian Airlines Flight 370, searchers still have yet to locate the missing plane, and time is running out. Soon there will be no more locatable “pings.” I watched what I believe was the last game the Toronto Maple Leafs will play this year, as they became the fire hydrant to Ottawa’s lifted leg. As usual, after a hopeful start to the season, the Leafs did what they have done for the last forty years; they broke our hearts, again. It baffles me, it wounds me to the core, and since self-medication, which is the coping mechanism for so many other Leafs fans, is no longer an option for me, I must find some other way to purge my growing rage. Music therapy helps. Played the Burk’s Falls Tavern again last Friday night for coffee house night and I think my anemic performing skills are beginning to blossom. This time, no one threw any vegetables at me, and that was after a whopping four original songs. I am using my Leafs rage to help me grow as an artist. Spring has descended upon the Great White North like a screaming harpy, and our property is now a muddy, sloppy mess. There is still a lot of snow to melt, and while many of the lakes have been drawn down to compensate, flooding is still a very real threat along local waterways. Residents of nearby Huntsville are paying close attention, and no one wants a repeat of last year’s destructive floods. This just in: “Everything’s gonna be awesome, chill out people, it’s like, not that big of a deal.” So I go, "What  Ever."

 

                        -  Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 4/7/14

Last Friday night, as part of Shauna’s ongoing mission to make our upcoming 20^th Anniversary a series of memorable celebrations, we drove down to Toronto to see the legendary blues guitarist Buddy Guy play at Massey Hall. I can now happily cross him off my bucket list of performers to see before I go. Recently I finished reading Guy’s memoirs When I Left Home, which is all about his experiences in Chicago playing with other blues legends like Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, and Junior Wells. I found his performance to be all the more meaningful, because I knew a little about his history, and about his experiences at Chess Records. At 78, Guy still kicks ass and takes no prisoners, and I left that concert in awe of his ability to entertain. What Shauna and I did not realized when she purchased the tickets was that Guy would be touring with another one of our guitar heroes, Jonny Lang. What a treat it was to hear the two of them making their guitars wail!  I think that might be one of the top ten concerts I have ever attended. Over twenty years ago Shauna and I met because of our love of music, and since then, we have attended a lot of concerts together. Although her tastes are extremely varied, Shauna is a lover of the blues, and so am I. Seated behind me and to my left was the one and only Randy Bachman of The Guess Who and Bachman Turner Overdrive. Very cool.

Because we live in a rural area, and because I am a lazy sloth-like couch potato who can’t be bothered to shop in a regular store, I have taken to ordering a lot of stuff online. In the past two months I have ordered everything from dehydrated refried beans, to an audio cassette player that converts my cassettes into digital music files. In truth, this consumer is becoming consumed, and the intoxication that comes from buying online is beginning to get the better of me. I may be developing a problem. For some items, unavailable locally, online buying is the convenient solution. I have learned that, if it is a large purchase, it is a good idea to personally inspect the item somewhere before ordering it online. I ordered a top-rated sound bar to improve the audio quality of our TV, but it would not work (something about wireless connectivity), and I had to send the whole thing back. I’d never had to return something that large through the mail – it was in two parts and weighed about 40 pounds - and the lady at our local post office gave me a really dirty look. Still, returning it by mail was lot easier than schlepping it back to a store, which in my case would have been 500 kilometers away. Glad I kept the box, which I often foolishly destroy while unpacking. The other day I ordered some SD cards (digital storage cards for my camera and 8 track digital recorder) from an online computer store, and I will probably never do that again. Returning from the physiotherapist in Huntsville the other day, I got a call (hands free of course, because we all know it is illegal to hold a cell phone while driving) from Purolator delivery to inform me that my SD cards were undeliverable. Purlolator does not have “a station” in Katrine. Well who does?! I thought those guys deliver everywhere. I was mistaken. Apparently they will only deliver locally if there is enough demand in the area, and that does not happen in Katrine, in the middle of winter (which apparently April is around here ), when the snow and ice are 6’ high. For my $8 delivery charge (it was still a better deal than buying locally) I had to travel 12 kilometres to pick up the package. I was particularly amused to see that four SD cards, with a combined size of approximately 4 square inches, were packed in a box large enough to hold a box of Kleenex. A small padded envelope would have sufficed and would have fit in my P.O box in Katrine! Oy.

Did you ever notice that those stickers they put on produce are sometimes impossible to remove? You know, the ones which tell you in tiny letters that the product is actually from Mexico, even though the sign on the bin indicates it was grown in Ontario. I destroyed a tomato the other day trying to unpeel one of these things. It’s a bit like the twist off beer bottle cap that will not twist because some stoner at the bottling plant decided to glue it on as a practical joke. My wife and mother-in-law are convinced that produce grown in Mexico will make them sick. Ironically, they don’t seem to have a problem with Peru and Costa Rica, and the twenty other countries wherein the water is perhaps not as clean as it should be.

OK, I win the Darwin Award of the week. We use a homemade concoction to repel squirrels which involves boiling habanero peppers in water and then using the mixture to make a pepper spray. The other day I crushed up some of the peppers to boil – they are very hot peppers – and then I went to the washroom to have a pee. Need I say more? I thought I had a urinary tract infection for about a half hour! We used to buy stuff called “Critter Buster” in a spray bottle but they charge an arm and a leg for what I can easily make in my kitchen. Fun fact: pepper spray is an effective deterrent for all sorts of pests. Advice? Wash your hands after handling hot peppers; I speak from personal experience!

                               -  Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report 3/31/14

Though it is rare for us to do much travelling together in the winter, Shauna and I drove down to Orillia on Thursday night, about a one and one half hour drive south from our home in Katrine, to attend a performance of Stuart McLean’s Vinyl Café. Sometimes compared to Garrison Keillor’s The Prairie Home Companion, Mclean’s show is equally amusing and airs weekly on CBC radio (http://www.cbc.ca/podcasting/includes/vinylcafe.xml.)  Shauna and I love Vinyl Cafe, and as an early 20th anniversary gift, Shauna managed to get tickets to this sold out performance. McLean is a very witty humorist, and his delivery is excellent. His featured singer/songwriter for this show was Lynn Miles, and though I was not familiar with her work, I am now a big fan. After the show we were still buzzing with the endorphins that great humor stimulates, and we grabbed a quick bite to eat in town before heading home back up Highway 11. I didn’t think much of the light snow falling as we left Orillia, but within fifteen minutes on the road, we were in the middle of a full blown snowstorm. We drove nervously through whiteout conditions for most of the ride home. As I have said before, that particular stretch of Ontario highway is notorious for its sometimes severe winter driving conditions, and Thursday night was a textbook example. A week into spring and I experienced my first white knuckle drive of the season!

Boy, am I sick of winter! I’m sure the Maritimers are fed up as well as last week they dug out from yet another brutal blizzard. My new project, while I am incarcerated in the icy grip of March, is to re-upholster my couch with groundhog pelts. I’ve got to take this aggression out on somebody, and besides, those weather groundhogs are waaaay overpaid. All the animals around here are freaking out, and we are all ticked off that Jack Frost has not yet thrown in the towel. The locals are calling this the worst winter in 40 years, and I read that this winter has been particularly hard on the local wild life. Deer are starving, especially the fauns, and the migrating birds that have already returned probably wish they hadn’t. Friday afternoon I looked out our front window and spotted a red fox on our front lawn. It is rare that we see fox, and this one looked pretty desperate and hungry. Of course as soon as she saw it, Jasper went into convulsions, and I had to explain to her how lucky she was to be an “indoor dog.” With all the wild turkeys wandering around in the vicinity, I am surprised that fox was in need of food.

They still haven’t found that Malaysian Airlines jet and last week recovery efforts were again hampered by severe weather. Last I checked there was a rather substantial debris field showing up on radar, but so far no confirmations. As one searcher said, they have not yet located the haystack, much less the needle, although as of last week the search was narrowed to a large area four hours off the west coast of Australia. I don’t think there could be a much more remote area to search, and one is reminded how difficult this task is to carry out.  Very hard to get closure when no one knows where the plane went down. Perhaps it flew into a parallel universe.

Actress Gwyneth Paltrow and Coldplay front man Chris Martin have separated after ten years of marriage. As they put it, they “consciously uncoupled.” Really? I thought that is something one does to train cars. The big talk and sabre rattling continue over Russia’s annexation of the Crimea, but short of trade sanctions (and are those even effective?) I don’t see anybody stepping in to change things. The Juno Awards took place last night, and just to name drop, we know two of the performers personally. My friend Tim Hicks, who is becoming a huge hit in country music circles, played in the Bachman Turner Overdrive salute, and our friend Mark Puffer was band leader for the Gord Bamford Band. Both of these guys are talented, hard-working musicians and it was good to see them play on Canada’s center stage for music.

That’s all for now. Time to go into town for my physiotherapy session. A few months ago I slipped on the ice and injured my shoulder. Just another casualty of this lovely winter. It’s almost over, right????!!

 

     -  Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

The Oppenheimer Report - 3/24/14

Yesterday, I travelled down to Bracebridge to attend the live recording session of friend and fellow songwriter, Sean Cotton. The studio where the recording was to take place was is called Ghetto Blaster Sound Factory, and I figured with a name like that, it would not be hard to find. I was wrong. I followed the directions on my GPS and, uncharacteristically, it did lead me to the general vicinity of the studio. As the GPS lady with the Aussie accent announced that I had reached my destination, I looked around to discover that “there was no there there.” I found myself in an industrial park which was, by all appearances, empty. Immediately to my right there was a parking lot full of empty school buses, in front of me a bunch of empty barn-like buildings, and to my left there were a few industrial buildings. It was then I recalled another musician friend telling me that this place would be hard for me to find. I drove all over the area looking for any signs of life, but there were none. Had it been a Saturday, perhaps there would have been someone walking about to ask, but all I saw was the snow blowing horizontally on an industrial wasteland; a flashback to how I spent a good part of my 25 years in the industrial real estate business. With fifteen minutes left until the recording session was to start, I got the sinking feeling I was in the wrong place, and I was cursing myself for not getting better directions from Sean. I called Shauna at home and asked her to look up the studio to see if there was a telephone number, and perhaps some directions that I had overlooked. She gave me a phone number to call, which of course was someone’s cell and unavailable. Then there was a stroke of luck. While I was on the phone I saw a taxi cab drive by in this otherwise deserted area, and I thought, this must be someone headed to the recording session. I followed it and sure enough, the cab stopped at a nondescript metal shed,completely hidden behind another industrial building, with no visible signs from the road. There was a guy smoking a cigarette outside a door with “MUSIC STUDIO” written on a cardboard sign in magic marker. I had reached my destination. I am happy I made it, because the recording session was interesting, the music was fantastic, and I had a chance to talk with Mike Lopez, one of the founders of Tree Ring Records and a musician with whom I had wanted to connect for a while. All in all, it was a good experience. 

I wish I understood global politics better, because I do not know what to make of Russia’s annexation of the Crimea. Some have likened this action and the U.S. decision to invade Iraq. In terms of “right" and "wrong” or "legal" and "illegal" I have no idea. I watched an interesting interview on Jon Stewart last Monday with some expert on Russian affairs who seems to feel that Putin’s decision to annex the Crimea was ill-advised. Apart from the kangaroo court referendum held to “let the people decide” there is the damage done to Putin’s credibility in the U.N. Now Russia faces economic sanctions from Europe and North America, but Putin doesn’t seem to care. He appears to be preparing to take over the entire Ukraine. What will “Mommy Jeans” Obama do about this one? Conservative pundits are comparing Obama to Putin and painting him as spineless and ineffective, but come on.  You’ve got to love Fox News for their unbiased reporting.

As I began writing this week’s installment there was still little to report on that missing Malaysian Airlines jet, but there were aerial photographs of some large pieces of floating debris which might have been from the crash. I haven’t seen this much rampant speculation about an unsolved mystery since the OJ trial. Nobody really knows what happened, but as each news source scrambles to break the big story, everyone is rolling out the flight experts, the psychologists, the fire experts, and even the completely unqualified to offer an opinion. If it sells ad space go for it, right? The problem is, there are hundreds of devastated families trying to find out where their missing loved ones have gone, and this kind of reporting must be hurtful to them. Did the pilot try to hide something by deleting files on his flight simulator, and is this some kind of red flag that he is a bad guy? Maybe he was just doing what a pilot should do in a crisis. I read an interesting theory on the disappearance of Flight 370, written by one veteran pilot. He suggests that all this speculation about nefarious intentions is off track, and that some other kind of catastrophic event took place on the flight. He suggests that an electrical fire might have broken out causing the tracking devices to stop working, and that the flight pattern was consistent with a pilot trying to land at an appropriate runway, found along the diversionary track. This line of thinking may turn out to be closer to the truth, but we may never know exactly what happened. I'm not sure there has ever been such a comprehensive search for a missing airplane

Watching one of those music competition shows the other night on TV I noticed a female vocalist who was otherwise attractive, but who had multiple face piercings and a grim, pale white complexion – sort of that heroin sheik look that was so fashionable among the emaciated supermodels ten years ago. I decided that her stage name should be “Zombie Tacklebox.” Then I started to think, “Hey, what a great name for my first album!" Look for James Oppenheimer’s seminal first effort “Zombie Tacklebox,” recorded at Ghetto Blaster Sound. I can picture the cover photo now!

 

Written by Jamie Oppenheimer c2014 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED