Muggsy's Brain

Two days in a row I had someone come into my shop in order to hit me up for money. I am used to the solicitations from non-profit organizations such as Big Brothers/Big Sisters, the Humane Society, the March of Dimes, etc., and they typically use the "soft sell" technique of sending you a piece of mail. These couple of organizations sent people. First was a man from a group called National Write Your Congressman , he was a very nice man who was from the area, has kids in the school system and all that. The group he represents gathers opinions on the concerns of the day from business owners (and others, I would assume) and then sends them all to your representatives. His sales technique bugged me, he wrote down my opinions, showed me the print material he had with him -- and then asked for money. They want a minimum of $425 per year for you to belong to their club. Why would I want to spent 1000 times the cost of a stamp to have someone else write my congressman for me? I ha...

The time was somewhere in the early 2000s, I'm not sure exactly when, but my band, Collective Unconscious , had a gig at the Norshor Theatre in Duluth, MN. We were led to believe that we would be playing as a part of a big, multi-band music event in the main theater, when we got there we found that was not the case. We wound up in the middle of a community art jamboree that was going on all over the building, there were bands in the main theater, but we weren't one of them. Instead we wound up in the upstairs lobby sharing the stage with several smaller groups, right before us was a blues band. We also got exposed to what I call "teenage girl poetry:" My love is like dry, blowing leaves... UGH! The blues band got done playing and moved their instruments and amps out of the way, fortunately a sound system was provided. Unfortunately it was out of phase with the outlets we had our amps plugged into. Old buildings, like the Norshor, have old wiring and sometim...