The Skeeter Daddle Diaries

A few of the Boyz were gathered at the South End Brewery’s Tasting Lounge this week, what Hophead, the brewmaster, refers to as the Test Lab. Try out some of his 10 gallon experiments on us layabouts and see if our finely attenuated palates approve before going into full bore production. Heavy Nettle IPA, Habanero Hefeweizen, Sinsemilla Stout — they all made it through our rigorous if hazy sampling regimen before hitting the consumer market with our rave review seals of approval.

Gary the Growler was opining over his Honey Nettle Lager how Pabst Blue Ribbon had just been sold to the Russians. “This is what it’s come to,” he lamented, peering into his glass with its frothy head as if consulting a liquid oracle. “Budweiser sells out to the foreigners and keeps a red white and blue can like we’re too stupid to see patriotism as an advertising ploy and now Pabst is bought up by the communists while they’re annexing pieces of Ukraine.”

“Business as usual, Gary,” Randy sniffs cynically. Randy’s van sits outside the taproom front window.     DON’T ROTO-ROOT IT      LET RANDY DO IT
Randy fell on hard times as a plumbing sub contractor when the housing bubble burst. He makes ends meet with pick-up jobs, clogged drains, kitchen remodels, toilet repair, but most afternoons he’s down at the Tasting Lounge licking wounds and foam. “The people who run this country would sell their grandmother for a buck fifty.”

“But Pabst Blue Ribbon, man,” Gary is saying. “That’s as American as apple pie. Maybe more American. My first beer was a PBR.”

“The beer that made Moscow famous,” Randy says, shaking his head and sipping his pint knowingly, a man who knows the game is rigged and not in his favor.

Hophead pours me a dark Heavy Nettle. “Don’t worry, boys,” he announces cheerfully. “This brewery is staying right here on the South End. I guess since we’re at the end of the island at the far edge of the continent, we’re the last beer in America.”

Randy shrugs. “If you think the South End is still in America, I guess. Some folks don’t. Me, I don’t know what America is anymore.” I raise my glass. “Drink up, Randy and cheer up. This isn’t the last beer. Not in a long shot. Next one’s on me and my capitalist cronies.”

As a roving cultural sociologist, I’m trained for acute observational situations, some not for the squeamish. Recently I have been traveling, plenty of airport time, and over the past week I have tuned in to public cellphone etiquette in a deep way. In a nutshell, there is no etiquette. Down on the South End folks have a cellphone but it hasn’t been surgically implanted. Yet. For the frequent flyer, it has ….

I used to be annoyed when perfect strangers stood next to me and shouted into their wireless devices. Nowadays I enjoy eavesdropping and even making commentary. Better they move off, not me. A lot of the boys like to chat while in the bathroom. Empty a bladder and catch up on the office goings-on. I suspect a lot of business is conducted with an open zipper. This may actually be what experts call multi-tasking. I hate to think — and I’ll spare you as well — what goes on behind stall doors. But it might go a long way toward explaining the economic downturn. Not to mention Apple’s sales successes, no doubt the result of phones dropped in the toilet.

Stewardesses now have to demand certain passengers turn off their phones. Apparently the cellularly addicted think it is not only an obligation to use their cell, it’s a constitutional right. Mark my words, you will see an upsurge in air marshals wrestling I-phones from furious passengers soon. To be disconnected for the length of a runway take-off is tantamount to ripping I-V drips from the terminally ill. The medical terminology is woefully behind, but Cellular Anxiety is real and it’s epidemic. On landing, every hand goes to a purse or a pocket. That first phonecall is better than a 12 A.M. shot of Jack Daniels for an alcoholic. It’s as if the entire airplane had breathed a collective sigh of relief now that 4-G widthdrawal is finally over. They’re fully connected once more. The nightmare, mercifully, has passed.

“Hi. We’re sitting at the terminal.” The world welcomes them back from the Void. All is well. All is right again. They’ll need to confirm this many times, but the healing process is at their ear. Speed dialing for health. The hive is buzzing happily.

Folks often ask why is it us artists don’t start a co-op art gallery down here on the South End the way most places with an overabundance of aesthetics and egos do. Truth is, we have considered it. And more than a few times, rejected the notion. Personally I love the idea of a joint venture with my fellow artisans, but … well, let’s be brutally honest here, we’re mostly a clueless lot fiscally. Whatever side of the brain controls creativity, it’s not the same side as the side that manages finance, money, business or advertising. In fact, I suspect if we ran a CAT scan on most of our brains, that area would be dark, almost as if aliens had stolen it.

Put a few dozen of us together, say, in a meeting to decide how to organize a co-op art gallery, and let me tell you, it’s an anarchist agenda right from the get-go. Maybe we just don’t get much beyond how many of our watercolors the wall space will hold. Forget leasing the building, forget who manages the sales, forget who sits the place open.

Then you got the issue of who can be IN the co-op. Everybody with a brush and an easel? Or do we jury in the members? And how much for dues? And what commission if anything ever sells? And how do you work the payback for sitting the store? And bylaws … oh yeah, gotta have rules and all that arguable rigamarole!

Ten minutes into the organizational meeting and you got total chaos. Artists vs.craftsmen. Volunteers vs. the Big Names. Rule makers vs. bohemians. Capitalists vs. hedonists. Believe me, you need to carry a weapon. Hopefully you won’t need to use it, but it’s best to be prepared. You think art is a spectator sport, you’d be at risk.

So yeah, we’ve flirted with the notion of an Art Co-op. About as likely as a Sunni-Shi-ite dance studio, you ask me. That’s why we pay galleries a 40-50% commission. To save lives, if nothing else — and probably worth every cent.

Sheila’s Salon was abuzz last Wednesday over a newspaper article Rhonda brought in. “Did you girls know the Equal Rights Amendment never passed?”  Ronald, magenta locks thrown back by his horse laugh over by the shampoo sink, hands full of Mrs. Amundsen’s blue curls, snorted, “Oh my, now the cows are out of the barn.”

Rhonda asked the room what exactly did this mean?? “Are we second class citizens? Can we vote? I mean, what the hell?” Mrs. Amundsen’s discomfort at the sudden heat of what had been an enjoyable conversation about the wonderful summer weather was palpable, at least to Ronald, but nevertheless, he gleefully added fuel to the fire. “Oh, honeys,” he said in mock sincerity, “haven’t you heard the news? You’re the weaker sex, darlings. We he-men can’t just hand out equal rights like bon bons, now can we?”

Sheila, worried that things were soon going to be out of hand, tried to throw cold water on Ronald’s hot jibes. “Of course we can vote. If they’ll let Ronnie’s husband vote, for heaven sake, they’ll let anybody vote.”

“Whoa there, girls! No need to make this personal. I didn’t have a vote on the Amendment when it failed. I was still at my mother’s breast.”

“She probably should’ve bottle fed you, Ronald,” Rhonda fairly shouted. “I just can’t believe, in the 21st Century, we don’t have equal rights. I mean, we got civil rights passed. Slavery’s over, I thought.”

Mrs. Amundsen was picking at her pink vinyl cape nervously, muttering, “My my my now.” Even Jenny Fowler, the hot yoga instructor of the cool demeanor, was growing agitated. “Are you sure it didn’t pass? I mean, why wouldn’t it?”

Revolutions grow from small events. Later, when heads are rolling down the chute, no one will remember — or much care — that Sheila’s South End Salon might have been Ground Zero for the superstorm that overshadowed the Great Recession and the Oil Wars. A woman scorned, once she realizes, well, Lord help the rest of us….