Rurple Pain

I have a somewhat startling admission to make. I'm kinda a Prince fan. OK, fan is maybe not exactly the right word, but I enjoy his lyrics and music. It's kinda like a mild flu, I guess, in how it kept creeping up and creeping up, and then Wham!, you realize you've got the fever.

It started in San Diego at a joint called Dirty Dan's down on the Pacific Highway (not to be confused with Pacific Coast Highway, or PCH, which I lived on in Long Beach). They used to play Little Red Corvette and 1999 a LOT. Well mercy, people, it's not like you can NOT tap your toes and want to sing along a little. Those songs were, are, quite infectious. And I thought to myself, "Well, even a blind chicken finds corn once in a while", which roughly translates from the Ed-head as, "Well, eventually he was bound to do something I liked."

Then Purple Rain came out. I went to see it, but back then there was hardly a release we didn't see. We were young, employed, and bored. Most of us lived on a ship so we'd do what we could do to get off the ship for a while without spending beaucoups bucks, and that, in a word, was movies. So yeah, we saw a lot of them.

So I saw the movie not because it was a Prince movie, but because it was a movie, period. I liked it though. I liked it quite a bit. There was a spot where it dragged a bit, but the songs...wow, the songs. I loved his stage presence. I went to see that movie 11 times. For some reason I never really wanted to buy the movie on VHs or DVD. I'd go see it in a theater again in a heartbeat. But still, I didn't feel that I liked Prince so much as I liked that movie Prince was in. Yes, denial runs deep for me.

The last straw was Ocala, FL in the late '90s. I'd say 1997. In fact I will say 1997, although there is about a +/-1 year error of margin. Or rather margin of error.

I had just drove down from Pascagoula on my way to see the folks. I did the I-10 East (for y'all northern folk, that's east/west in the deep south and a main artery for me as it ran from LA to Jacksonville with stops in El Paso, N'awlins, Biloxi, Mobile and Pensecola. Just west of Tallahassee I turned down and cruised small roads southward towards Tampa. That avoids a lot of the idiot snowbird drivers and the State Troopers they attract. On the back roads you go 85 MPH between towns and exactly 35 MPH through town. Do that and you'll be fine.

That's a feasable plan until about Ocala, where it is easier to just jump on I-75 than to deal with the development and congestion you encounter by trying to press further south on US 41. So I did. But first I stopped for a cup of coffee. I was sitting in the parking lot of a Sack n' Tote, sipping the coffe and listening to this great song. It had a real lively beat, really funky, and the lyrics were the best. But one line in particular hooked me: Act you age, not your shoe size. When the announcer said the song was Kiss by Prince, I decided then and there that I liked him. No denying it further. I've bought several of his albums and love playing them.

I have a love hate relationship with soft toilet paper. The softer it is, the more my butt goes, "Ahhhhhh." But also, the more easily it tears at the slightest friction. So what, am I perhaps a bit too aggressive?

Man, I like Skittles. No, I really like them. But as I've said many, many times after the first and only time I tried it, DON'T PUT THEM IN YOUR ICE CREAM. Really. Just don't.

Is there anything better than a bologna and cheese sandwich that is top browned? (My bologna has no first name/it's just dead cows and stuff/My bologna has no second name/It only costs a buck/Oh, I love to eat it every day/and if you ask me why I'll say/'Cause nothing make a big old turd/like b-o-l-o-g-n-a) Put the bread in a toaster oven with the tray in, put a bologna on one of the bread slices and a Kraft slice on the other. Top brown for a minute sos the bologna is hot and the cheese is melted. Remove and assemble. It's great. The bologna is cooked and the cheese is all soft and gooey but there's none of that annoying crunch you get with toast. Mmmmm, perfection.

I won't put salt on anything but french fries and cantaloupe. Everything else is fine without it.

Don't you feel a lot like Batman when you come driving up to your house and just as you're turning into your drive you hit the garage door opener and you roll right in, just clearing the opening door like you were zipping into the Bat cave where Alfred was waiting to tell you Commissioner Gordon just called and there's a problem back in Gotham City? Yeah, me too.

OK, the wife will no doubt be up soon and there's still some things I need to talk to me about. So, signing off. Keep the face. Or is that, keep the faith? I can never really be sure.

Ramblin' Ed