Staycation, CD purchases and Davy Jones

My staycation is nearly over. I'm back to work on Tuesday. And I have done squat in terms of blogging. In fact the last entry was written BEFORE the vacation started. Well, part of that had to do with my laptop fizzling out and needed a new hard drive. That was two or three days of driving back and forth to get work done on it and taking the start-up discs there. Tell ya what, though, I feel like I've already gotten my money out of the Geek Squad. I had to get them to help me reinstall a crucial program this morning. It took half a day and they were cool about it.

For those of you in Pittsburgh who don't already know, Paul's CDs has now knocked their going out of business prices down to 40% off. I went in and went crazy today, after having already been in there once earlier in the week. Today's booty includes an FMP Cecil Taylor big group (with Charles Gayle), the ECM trio Fly, Thelonious Monk w/John Coltrane (all I have is a crappy dub from 20+ years ago), Archie Shepp, a live Pernice Brothers CD and I think one other thing. I did get the wife a Scott Walker disc too.

I suppose this is the place where I should opine about the passing of Davy Jones, Monkees booster that I am. To be honest Davy was never my favorite Monkee. In fact he might have been my least favorite, the highest honor going to Mr. Nesmith - for both his first name and for the fact that he played guitar, which when I got a couple of their albums at the tender age of 5 or 6, was a serious criteria. (Why else would I have thought Tito Jackson was the coolest member of the Jackson 5?) And I just can't shake the memory of an interview he gave the Post-Gazette in 1999 when he came here on tour with Bobby Sherman and some other idol like Peter Noone. He trashed the rest of the Monkees, sounding bitter and whiny. Unfortunately the P-G's online service doesn't go back that far, otherwise I'd link it.

Still, it doesn't seem right that Davy has left us so soon. He was always good for a couple of yuks. There's the recurring, "I am standing up," joke from the series, that was riffed on endlessly. "You must be joking," was another stock line. Besides "I'll Be True to You" is a really strong cut on the first album. Actually, the first four Monkees albums have some decent Davy cuts on them. ("I Wanna Be Free" serving as one of the more notable exceptions.) And despite his nasty thoughts in the above interview, an article this weekend made him seem like the nice Monkee while Peter Tork was the crabby one. So there are some benefits that come with being Mr. Entertainer.