Jersey Mike

BARGUMENT. 
File under: “Gee, nothing better to post about today, eh Jersey?”

Until about ninety seconds ago, I thought that I was the only person that ever went to a bar and combined two words while I was speaking.

In this case, causing a collision of the words “Bar” and “Argument” or; Bargument. An argument that normally takes place within the confines of a bar or spirit-serving establishment.

You see, an argument is quite different than a bargument.

An argument is normally between two people of sound mind discussing the differences and different advantages or disadvantages on opposite sides of a common subject.

A bargument, however, is a completely different social interaction altogether.

You see, barguments are never won. How’s that joke go? Arguing on the internet is like winning the special olympics? Even if you win…

ANYWAY- up until about ninety seconds ago, I actually believed that I was the first person on the planet to coin that term. But a quick Google search proved me horribly wrong- SO wrong, in fact, that some guy named Doug Hanks actually wrote a BOOK about and filled with Barguments.

His site defines a bargument as follows: “You can’t be proven right or wrong in a bargument.

“Which quarterback threw the most Super Bowl interceptions” may qualify as a great sports trivia question, but it’s not a bargument. This is: “Who would you rather face in a bar fight: a quarterback or a pitcher?”

Barguments can’t be a buzz kill. So no barguments about poverty or war, unless it’s a pretend war between wolves and monkeys.

And barguments shouldn’t be too complex. A good rule of thumb: If you can’t debate it after three beers, it’s not a bargument.”

So there you have it. Don’t forget- this Thursday is the monthly Tweetup/Bargument.

Come hang out. And we’ll bargue.

If you’re not a Hold Steady fan, stop reading this entry right now.

I’m thirty two years old.

To date, I’ve lived in New Jersey, Hartford, Long Island, Hartford again, Jersey again, spent a fair amount of time between San Francisco and Los Angeles, two years in the Great White North and finally, the past seven years have been here in the greater Harrisburg area.

I’ve done everything from managing a bad-check collections call center to slinging Christmas Trees on a vacant lot along the river, was an ice-cream man for about forty eight hours two summers ago, hustled speakers out of the back of a white minivan for quite some time in the nineties, was a radio DJ on two different stations over the course of two years and, most recently, have been a talent buyer and concert promoter for a four hundred-person capacity rock club/music venue/brewery and, to pay the rent, I stagehand for my local chapter of the IATSE union.

And threading all of those moves and jobs together is my life. I had cancer when I was twenty. I powered through six months of chemotherapy, thirty days of radiation and five years of CT scans, bone scans, bloodwork and lost hair (Hodgkins Lymphoma). Eventually got married in Vegas, divorced in Harrisburg and discovered myself in a strange, strange land called “Central Pennsylvania” with, literally, nothing but the clothes on my back, my computer, stereo system and shared custody of a newborn baby girl we named Kaiya.

“What the hell I’ll tell my story again”

31 Flavors and I have been together for just over a year- and it’s the longest relationship I’ve been in since the divorce.

But trust me, I’ve had my heart ripped from deep inside my well guarded chest and stomped on the ground my fair share of times over the years.

And, although we try to tell ourselves that it gets easier each time, the harsh reality is that it actually gets harder and more difficult to decode the static-peppered communication waves in the pursuit of the perfect mate.

I know frustration. I know anger. I know fear. I know uncertainty. I know doubt. (They’re all good friends of mine)

But I also know hope. I know promise. I know how positive energy is infectious and invites it’s counterparts confidence, happiness, contentment, pleasure and success to the fold.

“Lord, I’m sorry to question your wisdom
But my faith has been wavering
Won’t you show me a sign,
And let me know that you’re listening?”  

Kaiya starts Kindergarten in seven days. 

Seven days until my little girl dives into the blurry and questionable public school system and, although I’m not a religious man, I pray that she’s fortunate enough to attend twelve years of public school with few (or no) catastrophic incidents.

She’ll learn to tell time – which, I believe, is the mile-marker that indicates the crossover from wild-eyed and bewildered with the world to the point of reference in that all of us- humans who’ve endured the reigns of the current social system within which we exist- can remember as the end of our innocence.

Time for school. Time for lunch. Time for recess. Time for homework. Time for dinner. Time for TV. Time for bed. Time for school. Time for lunch. Time to get back to work. Time to take a mandatory fifteen minute break to smoke and power up on coffee. Time to commute home. Et cetera, et cetera.

It’s certainly safe to say that, along my path thus far, I’ve discovered for myself exactly what it means to hold it steady. 

I’ve discovered for myself how to stay positive.

“Man, we make our own movies.”

Last Wednesday, I drove three hundred and six miles to Norfolk, Virginia to see The  Hold Steady at The Norva. Wednesday night- actually very early Thursday morning, I drove towards Virginia Beach and slept in my car…waking up with a coffee and a banana watching dolphins frolic about sixty yards offshore and then driving one hundred ninety three miles up I-95 back to DC for the sold out 9:30 club show. [And semi-related, Friday afternoon I drove the hundred and nineteen miles up US-15 back to Harrisburg; only to wake up Saturday morning and ride in the ABC Boxtruck up to State College to work a beerfest all day Saturday; and finally, after riding back to Harrisburg Sunday morning, we had a quick breakfast and then drove out near Philly to take care of some business.]

After an exhaustive drive for six hours Wednesday on interstate highway, it was rewarding to change my shirt and put on sneakers, stroll around the corner and kick back a few cold, refreshing beers with a fellow message board moderator and his warm and welcoming wife.

Hold Steady fans aren’t like regular music fans. Meaning: we don’t really fit into a single demographic. 

Jonas Brothers fans generally fit a demographic.

Bruce Springsteen fans generally fit a demographic.

Disco Biscuit fans, generally, fit a demographic all their own.

Last Wednesday night I drank beers with a guy in his fifties who flew into Norfolk from Salt Lake City just to see The Hold Steady.

Last Thursday night, I hugged and high-fived Hard Corey- a nineteen year old indie rock grrrl from North Jersey who made the trek to DC to see The Hold Steady.

And standing right behind her was Mona- the fifty-something sweetheart of a lady who discovered The Hold Steady on the Springsteen message boards- and was attending her seventh show. Which, in a comforting and odd way, made me feel like I was there with my Mom.

Then there was brother Chris- the NYC attorney who buys many drinks for many people while displaying signs of being the most hardcore, badass sonofabitch I’ve ever met. He’s the skinny guy you’d want in your corner in a streetfight- he looks relatively harmless, but this dude will kick your ass three times til’ Tuesday.

AndyM is somewhere in his twenties. He’s sort of a drifter. But his trip from Philly to DC was inspired by the same thing as the rest of us: unity. 

So to put it broadly, Hold Steady fans are all over the map. An unclassifiable genus of hardcore and devoted superfans who go to great lengths in support of our favorite band.

We’re all in this together, you see, and there’s no better social-representation of that than at a Hold Steady show.

Even Wednesday at the Norva- there were maybe three hundred people there; most of them first-timers- the feeling of community and belonging and camradarie and warmth and joy and respect- is simply too large to ignore.

“It’s hard to explain…but it’s this…There is so much joy in what we do up here” remarked Craig Finn about two and a half minutes into a twelve minute Killer Parties on Thursday night.

He says it every show. At some point or another, in probably ninety five percent of the performances The Hold Steady has played, he says the same thing.

But know what?

He’s right.

Shit certainly gets quite crazy and complicated at times, but there is so much joy in the world.

And we’ve all got it in us.

We’ve got potential.

We’ve got promise.

We’ve got everything we need at our fingertips.

“We are our only saviors; we’re gonna build something this summer.”

Like that?

It’s that time again.

My last multi-city, multi-day road trip was taken on an Amtrack train from Harrisburg to Newark to Providence and back again.

This next little jaunt will take me from Harrisburg to Norfolk, VA back up to DC and back home to Harrisburg on a little Hold Steady excursion.

So at the end of this trip I’ll have seen Billy Joel, Bruce Springsteen and The Hold Steady this summer.

Not bad, methinks.

I won’t be updating here for the rest of the week but will be most likely Tweeting my Twip on Twitter- if we’re not already buds, follow me here

Have a good weekend, Harrisburg.

See you on Monday.

OMG.

LOL. [kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/dQJ2SegGWyc" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]

WTF.
This is my new favorite commercial. (TIMNFC)

Patriot News reporter Daniel Victor wrote a story about the negative effects the weak economy is having on restaurant servers and bartenders tip monies.

The story ran on the front page, above the fold of this past Sunday’s Patriot News.

Within that story, a server and a bartender from the restaurant Spice in Downtown Harrisburg were interviewed and quoted.

John Burkholder was quoted as saying “You have to pretty much be the best server ever and make them feel like crap for leaving you anything less than you deserve.”

Monday morning, John was fired from his server gig at Spice.

Bartender Molly Turner remarked to Victor how the tightening of the belts of her customers has resulted in fewer trips to the beach this summer.

Molly got fired too.

Now obviously, there is going to be mega debate about this this event. As I’m typing this, there are one hundred twenty two comments on the article posted at PennLive.com

And obviously, I’m going to weigh in here.

1. Pennsylvania is an “at-will” employer state. Which basically means that if you have a job, your boss can fire you if he or she does not like the color of the tie you wear. And the only recourse one would have would be to file for unemployment compensation. (So don’t even waste your breath trying to argue that these two have any sort of case in court.)

2. If you speak to the press (especially print) you should expect to get misquoted or quoted out of context. While they were yammering on to the reporter looking forward to calling their parents to proudly tell them they were going to be in the paper, he was jotting down notes furiously in shorthand and listening for that piece of gold to add weight to the report. And maaan did he ever strike paydirt when Burkholder uttered the words “make them feel like crap” with regard to paying customers at an eating establishment!

3. When you’re quoted in the press with regard to your place of employment, you are speaking as a representative of that company- regardless of your position. Little Mary Swanson reading her Sunday paper over tea and biscuits does not care that John Burkholder is only a server at Spice. Little Mary Swanson read that servers at Spice intentionally make people “feel like crap” in order to guilt them into tipping more. Plain and simple.

4. I’m sorry, but trips to the beach, as Molly Turner lamented about taking fewer of, are not a customer at Spice (or any restaurant’s) concern. Sure, Molly Turner needs to pay her rent and car loan- and that’s why patrons should tip her what she deserves based on the quality of her service. If she wants to be able to afford more trips to the beach, she should find better paying employment.

5. I’m not going to boycott Spice. In fact, I’ve never even been there to begin with. But I may actually go now- if anything, to support the business owner who is likely dealing with a shitstorm at the office today.

6. Contrary to what the Patriot News headline read, the two servers were not, in fact, fired for talking to a reporter. (Don’t give yourselves too much credit, Newhouse). The server and bartender were fired for saying the wrong thing to the reporter. Had Burkholder not told a reporter from a major newspaper that he intentionally treats customers “like crap”, he would probably still have a job today- earning those limited tips.

7. And finally, Molly Turner most likely got fired because if Spice fired one, they had to fire the other. I don’t believe that what she said was really out of line. But then again, she didn’t tell a Patriot News reporter that she treats her customers “like crap”.

So, in conclusion, it was a fun debate- to say the least. But at the end of the day, the guys who own Spice have a business to run. And they simply will not tolerate some server who has no vested interest in the business telling a newspaper reporter that he treats his customers like crap and then having his quote wind up on the front page of the Sunday paper.

Wow. All of this debate is making me hungry. I think I’ll go eat at Spice.